Tag: Ridgewood NJ

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Ridgewood proposal would allow higher pay rate

Village_Manager_Roberta_Sonenfeld_theridgewoodblog

SEPTEMBER 18, 2015    LAST UPDATED: FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2015, 12:31 AM
BY MARK KRULISH
STAFF WRITER |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS

Last week, the Village Council discussed a possible change to an ordinance that would allow for the hiring of employees at a pay rate higher than the lowest salary possible on a case-by-case basis.

The ordinance would give the village manager discretion in hiring an employee with qualifications that suggest bringing them on at a higher salary, which officials said would allow the village to get the best employee for the position.

Village Manager Roberta Sonenfeld characterized the change as an attempt to update an ordinance that has become obsolete. The amended ordinance would only apply to Civil Service classified positions that have already been budgeted.

“When you think about the police and bringing in inter-governmental transfers, we would not bring them in at step one. We would bring them in higher,” Sonenfeld said. “Or to the extent we’re bringing in somebody to the water utility that has certain licensing that has different market value than it had, those are the kinds of things I’m thinking about.”

Deputy Mayor Albert Pucciarelli said the change would be a good one since it would give the manager “flexibility” to do whatever is necessary to get the best candidate. The ordinance, as it is currently written, could eliminate candidates who might otherwise be desirable.

Pucciarelli also referenced a situation that occurred in January 2014 when the Ridgewood Police Department had more officers hired than the ordinance allowed as an example of why this change would be beneficial.

“I think that’s consistent with good management rather than as we saw, for example, a couple of years ago in the case of the police department,” said Pucciarelli. “We had a number of police that was established and I said ‘well, maybe we’re breaking the law, but that’s not a good law. Why should the council establish the number of policemen? That’s a management function and it should be done on a case-by-case basis or in conjunction with the chief of police.'”

https://www.northjersey.com/news/proposal-would-allow-higher-pay-rate-1.141261

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American Native a Documentary that Explores Struggle of New Jersey’s Ramapough at TribeClearview Warner Quad Theater in Ridgewood

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Documentary Explores Struggle of New Jersey’s Ramapough Tribe

By TAMMY LA GORCEAUG. 8, 2015

Corey Bobker was an accomplished 30-something adult when he took his first drive into the Ramapo Mountains in 2010. But the 12-year-old version of him still had knots in his stomach.

“When I was a kid growing up, everybody knew you don’t go up into the mountains because you’d get shot,” said Mr. Bobker, producer of the documentary “American Native.” His film explores the struggles of the Ramapough Lenape Nation, a Native American tribe with about 5,000 members, according to its chief, Dwaine C. Perry. The Ramapough live mostly across the Stag Hill region of Mahwah, Ringwood and nearby Hillburn, N.Y.

Mr. Bobker, of Los Angeles, grew up in Livingston. As a child, he attended summer camp in Stanhope, near the Ramapos in Mahwah. He had not gotten close to the mysterious mountain chain again until this anxiety-ridden car trip to visit with the tribe for the first time. “I was definitely worried,” he said. “I thought, Maybe it’s true — maybe they’re going to confront us if we say something the wrong way.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/nyregion/documentary-explores-struggle-of-new-jerseys-ramapough-tribe.html?_r=0

 

THU, SEPTEMBER 17, 2015
AT 07:30 PM Warner Quad
Ridgewood, NJ

https://gathr.us/screening/reserve/12798

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Central Business District Forum will resume next Wednesday, September 23, at 730 PM

Deputy_Mayor_Albert_Pucciarelli_theridgewoodblog

file photo by Boyd Loving

Next CBD Forum – September 23 at 7:30PM – Village Hall

Our Central Business District Forum will resume next Wednesday, September 23, at 730 PM, in the Village Hall Courtroom. We will discuss the new garage planned for Broad and Hudson Streets. No longer just a nice idea, the garage is moving into the design phase. We have already seen some exciting design possibilities that will be offered to our residences for their consideration. The Mayor will attend the forum and he and I will bring everyone up to date as to where the process stands and where it is headed, including a look forward at the all-important referendum on November 3. Please join us and invite your friends and neighbors to attend.

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Which stage of watering restrictions are we really in?

ridgewood water

By Ridgewood Water’s own definitions, our current restrictions are Stage III, not IV.

Ridgewood Water website (https://water.ridgewoodnj.net/) says:

Current Water Restrictions: STAGE IV.

Irrigation using a hand-held hose only is limited to Tuesdays and Saturdays for odd numbered addresses and Wednesdays and Sundays for even numbered addresses.

Ridgewood Water’s website also says (click on Water Restrictions, next-to-last bullet point under Resources):

Stage I  (Moderate) – Mandatory restriction of irrigation to Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays for properties with odd-numbered addresses and Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays for properties with even-numbered addresses.  Irrigation using a hand-held hose shall be allowed at any time. No irrigation shall be allowed on Mondays except for the use of a hand held hose.

Stage II  (Severe) – Mandatory restriction of irrigation to Tuesdays and Saturdays for properties with odd-numbered addresses and Wednesdays and Sundays for properties with even-numbered addresses.  No irrigation shall be allowed on Mondays, Thursdays, or Fridays except for the use of a hand held hose. Irrigation using a hand held hose shall be allowed at any time.

Stage III  (Pending/Critical) – Mandatory restriction of irrigation to the use of a hand held hose on Tuesdays and Saturdays for properties with odd-numbered addresses and Wednesdays and Sundays for properties with even-numbered addresses.  No irrigation of any kind shall be allowed on Mondays, Thursdays, or Fridays.

Stage IV  (Critical) – Irrigation is prohibited at any time. Exceptions for irrigation using a hand held hose may be allowed under conditions prescribed by the Village Manager of the Village of Ridgewood.

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Iron Chef Cat Cora tonight Wednesday, September 16th, 7:00pm at Bookends in Ridgewood

Cat-Cora_theridgewoodblog

Catherine Ann “Cat” Cora is a professional chef best known for her featured role as an “Iron Chef” on The Food Network, Cat Cora, will sign her new book: Cooking as Fast as I Can

From Iron Chef and Around the World in 80 Plates, CAT CORA, will sign her new book: Cooking As Fast As I Can ($25.00). Books available: September 15th.*Books must be purchased from Bookends Bookstore.

Appearing authors will only autograph books purchased at Bookends and must have valid Bookends Receipt.

Availability & pricing for all autographed books subject to change.
First In Line Certificate use is the the discretion of Bookends. Blackout dates may apply.
Bookends cannot guarantee that the books that are Autographed will always be First Printings.
Autographed books purchased at Bookends are non-returnable.

While we try to ensure that all customers coming to Bookends’ signings will meet authors and get their books signed, we cannot guarantee that all attendees will meet the author or that all books will be signed.  We cannot control inclement weather, author travel schedules or authors who leave prematurely.

Bookends, 211 E. Ridgewood Avenue, Ridgewood, NJ   07450   201-445-0726

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Reader says NO to the Senior Survey

gwenn hauck

Does anybody actually believe the Village’s upcoming senior survey will help seniors? What can the Village possibly do to “help” other than add more lunch sessions to Ms Hauck’s playlist? (She’s only doing her lunches to get votes anyway, although she would be unlikely to win if she ran again…she achieved third place by only a handful of votes in 2012. Did Aronsohn’s P.R. advisers, White Horse Strategies, come up with seniors as her ideal constituency? Please.)

I’d bet dollars to Dunkin’ that the unmentioned goal of the survey, or at least the reason the Amigos support it, is to assemble an email and address list of residents over a certain age so they can assault a targeted audience with materials on those intended new apartments, the assisted-care place, realtor ads, and who-knows-what-all. Somehow something dastardly is being planned. The people who suggested the survey probably don’t know that–I’m not necessarily faulting them.

Well, I have no intention of playing into their hands by responding in any way, and I suggest that others age 60+ do the same, or at least read all the questions before agreeing to supply any answers. And don’t let them have your email address.

Unfortunately, three-fifths of the current Village Council has behaved so selfishly and cynically in ways that will destroy the Village that it has become impossible to attribute motives to them other than egotism, greed, and self-seeking.

https://www.northjersey.com/news/health-news/survey-to-review-needs-of-seniors-1.1406075

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Ridgewood seeks Bergen County grant for Schedler property development

Zabriskie-Schedler_Property_theridgewoodblog

SEPTEMBER 15, 2015    LAST UPDATED: TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 2015, 9:35 AM
BY MARK KRULISH
STAFF WRITER |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS

Improvements to existing baseball fields and the potential installation of a new one were on the agenda for the Village Council last Wednesday evening.

The governing body approved a gift from the Ridgewood Baseball Softball Association (RBSA) and endorsed a resolution authorizing the submission of an application for a matching open space grant from Bergen County.

The village is seeking a grant from the Bergen County Open Space, Recreation, Floodplain Protection, Farmland & Historic Preservation Trust Fund, which provides matching grants to local governments for assistance in redeveloping outdoor public facilities.

Last month, the council adopted a resolution to follow recommendations made in a 2012 Open Space Committee report that called for a 90-foot baseball diamond and a multi-purpose overlay field along with passive recreation opportunities to be built on the Schedler property.

A matching grant of $100,000 is available for Schedler Park Development – Phase I, which includes cleaning the park of dead trees, demolishing the garage and shed, stump removal and the capping of a well, said Village Manager Roberta Sonenfeld.

The timing of the grant application prompted questions from both residents and council members as the deadline for submission to Bergen County was Sept. 3.

The resolution had only been approved Sept. 9, a week later.

https://www.northjersey.com/news/funding-sought-for-schedler-property-1.1410011

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Thomas Sowell: Misinformed Electorate, Not Trump, Is Real Danger

VOTE_theridgewoodblog

BY THOMAS SOWELL

In a country with more than 300 million people, it is remarkable how obsessed the media have become with just one — Donald Trump.

What is even more remarkable is that, after six years of repeated disasters, both domestically and internationally, under a glib egomaniac in the White House, so many potential voters are turning to another glib egomaniac to be his successor.

No doubt much of the stampede of Republican voters toward Trump is based on their disgust with the Republican establishment. The fact that the next two biggest vote getters in the polls are also complete outsiders — Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina — reinforces the idea this is a protest.

It is easy to understand why there would be pent-up resentments among Republican voters. But are elections held for the purpose of venting emotions?

No national leader ever aroused more fervent emotions than Adolf Hitler did in the 1930s. Watch some old newsreels of German crowds delirious with joy at the sight of him. The only things at all comparable in more recent times were the ecstatic crowds that greeted Barack Obama when he burst upon the political scene in 2008.

Read More At Investor’s Business Daily: https://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials-on-the-right/091415-770937-thomas-sowell-trump-obscures-worthier-candidates-but-only-because-public-is-poorly-informed.htm#ixzz3lqC9ekMW

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Ridgewood continues talks on North Walnut Street site

town_garage_theridgewoodblog

SEPTEMBER 14, 2015    LAST UPDATED: MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 2015, 9:35 AM
BY MARK KRULISH
STAFF WRITER |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS

With the prospect of a parking garage on Hudson Street and a vote looming on the fate of multifamily housing in the village, things are heating up downtown as summer comes to an end.

Last Wednesday, the council revived the subject of the North Walnut Street redevelopment zone and the potential future uses for the site, namely the possibility of housing for seniors in need of long-term personal care.

Preliminary negotiations have begun with Kensington Senior Development, which pitched an assisted-living facility for the Town Garage site at a council meeting in March.

One of the goals of redeveloping the North Walnut Street zone is to bring additional parking spaces to Ridgewood’s Central Business District (CBD).

The request for proposal (RFP) put out by the village stated a parking garage built on the site would have to result in a net gain of 100 spaces for village use. That number is beyond the spaces currently available and any spots reserved for the development.

Kensington proposed a 60-foot-high facility with 98 assisted-living units and retail space on the first floor for the 1.1-acre site, along with a parking garage to be built and donated to the village.

https://www.northjersey.com/news/talks-on-ridgewood-housing-proposal-continue-1.1409623

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Village Council Caves on demands for a Second Meeting to hear public comments on the multi-family housing

Village Council

photo by Boyd Loving

September 14,2015
the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, The Mayor Paul Aronsohn and the Village Council has given in to the public outcry for a Second Meeting to hear public comments on the multi-family housing . On June 24 at a public meeting the Mayor basically told resident Boyd Loving to sit down and shut up when he suggested that more than one public hearing was in order.

Boyd was adamant that one night would make it difficult for some people to attend and that this one-night plan was completely contrary to the manner in which the Valley hearings were conducted.   At that time the Mayor was unwilling to listen to this reasonable suggestion.

Perhaps recent events such as the lawsuit brought by the CBR, as well as intense public outcry about the single meeting, and even the Ridgewood News editorial,  have caused a change of heart.   Boyd it seems, was dare we say it, RIGHT.

Now perhaps you will listen to Boyd’s other suggestion to secure a larger venue for the hearings, so that overflow citizens are not sequestered in the basement of Village Hall and are somehow shuttled up and down stairs to the microphone.

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Reader says high density housing will only result in MORE children in school AND HIGHER taxes for services to support those children

clock ridgewood NJ

It’s been said before and should keep being said, we all want seniors to be able to stay in town if they would like. Apartments currently exist for that purpose and a few more can and maybe should be built within the current density levels.

But the worst thing that could happen to seniors who would like to stay in their homes would be for hundreds of new apartments to be built. Either families would occupy those apartments OR the homes vacated by seniors moving into apartments. Either way the result is MORE children in school AND HIGHER taxes for services to support those children (school budget is by far the largest % of our tax bills). We NEED to find ways for people without children in school to stay in their homes and increasing the school budget is not the way to do it.

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Woman suing The Valley Hospital dies

Valley_Hospital_theridgewoodblog

SEPTEMBER 12, 2015    LAST UPDATED: SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 2015, 1:21 AM
BY LINDY WASHBURN
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD

A woman who sued The Valley Hospital, her doctors and the maker of a medical device that she claimed caused the spread of her cancer has died, just days after providing videotaped testimony to be used when her lawsuit comes to trial.

Viviana Ruscitto, a radiology administrator and the mother of a 2-year-old boy, was 43.

Ruscitto was diagnosed with metastatic leiomyosarcoma, a rare and aggressive cancer, a few weeks after undergoing surgery for uterine fibroids at the Ridgewood hospital last October.

During the minimally invasive procedure, a device known as a laparoscopic power morcellator was used to shred and grind the tissue to be removed so that the fragments could be sucked out through a small incision.

The morcellator’s spinning blade disperses particles from the shredded tissue throughout the abdomen and enables some cells to be absorbed and transported by the lymph system.

The federal Food and Drug Administration recently said that 1 in every 350 women who undergoes a hysterectomy for fibroids has a cancer that may not have been detected but would be spread through morcellation.

https://www.northjersey.com/counties/woman-suing-hospital-dies-1.1408599

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Woman struck and killed by train near Ridgewood station

Ridgewood_Train_Statin_theridgewoodblog

SEPTEMBER 12, 2015, 10:53 AM    LAST UPDATED: SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 2015, 12:53 PM
BY MARINA VILLENEUVE
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD

A NJ Transit train struck and killed a woman on tracks east of the Ridgewood station Saturday morning.

The Waldwick-bound train struck the woman, who has not been identified, at 8 a.m. Saturday morning, according to NJ Transit spokeswoman Jennifer Nelson.

Nelson said the woman was trespassing in the area where the Bergen and Main lines intersect when she was struck.

The woman was pronounced dead at 8:37 a.m.

Nelson called it a “confirmed fatality,” and said that only a medical examiner could determine the incident was a suicide.

“As to what occurred, we don’t know,” Nelson said. “She was on the tracks, we don’t know how she got there.”

https://www.northjersey.com/news/woman-struck-and-killed-by-train-near-ridgewood-station-1.1408696

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“Rubber Stamp ” Approval of High Density Housing in Ridgewood

clock_cbd_theridgewoodblog
Dear CBR friends and supporters,
 
The Ridgewood News editorial today highlights in the importance of the September 16 Village Council meeting for the future of our village, and asks the Mayor and Council, “What’s the Hurry?”   (see link below)
The Ridgewood News approached CBR to make a statement about how the Village Council intends to rush the vote to approve ordinances that would allow high density housing, and asked our opinion on holding the public hearing on a night that conflicts with many Back-to-School nights.  (see our statement to the Ridgewood News below)
 
We have asked the Mayor and Council to reschedule the meeting.  We urge YOU to also email the Mayor and Council and ask them to either reschedule the public hearing, or to schedule additional opportunities for public comment in the future on this very important matter.  The email addresses are below.  Also, please continue to reach out to friends and neighbors and encourage everyone to attend this vital meeting on Wednesday, September 16.
Thank you for your support.
 
Citizens for a Better Ridgewood
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September 11th – Ridgewood Remembers Our Neighbors and Friends

911_theridgewoodblog

For the month of September, “Portraits” of the 12 residents Ridgewood lost in the Trade Center attack on September 11, 2001, will be displayed in the Ridgewood Library Auditorium which is open 7 days a week.

All are invited to visit this exhibit to reflect and remember –

September 11 Remembrance in Ridgewood theridgewoodblog.net

Richard Blood; Michael Carroll; Daniel McGinley; James Munhall; Charlie Murphy; Steven Paterson; Michael San Phillip; Bruce Simmons; Steven Strobert; Gina Sztejnberg; Jon Vandevander; and Christopher Wodenshek.

Mass at 7 p.m. at Mount Carmel Church, Passaic and Prospect streets.