Washington’s Birthday is the official name designated to what many of us know as President’s Day. During the month of February the birthday of two of our greatest President’s takes place. Both George Washington who was born on Feb. 22nd and Abraham Lincoln born on Feb. 12th.
However, Washington’s birthday has been publicly celebrated since he was in office, before Abraham Lincoln was even born. Much of the debate over the name of the holiday springs from the fact that state’s can follow their own holidays how they see fit and many of them chose to also honor Lincoln, calling the celebration President’s Day.
It was in 1968 that the term President’s Day came up for legal consideration in the Congress but was shot down, though the holiday was moved to fall between the two President’s birthdays. Again in the 1980’s there was a resurgence of the term with advertisers which solidfied the holiday name in American culture. Today, few Americans perfer to call the holiday Washington’s Birthday in lieu of President’s Day.
To Honor Presidents Day the Ridgewood blog will use this week to give a little back ground on a few of our late presidents , we started with Lincoln last week and we will end with Washington next Monday.
The legend of Groundhog Day is based on an old Scottish couplet: “If Candlemas Day is bright and clear, there’ll be two winters in the year.”
Every February 2, people gather at Gobbler’s Knob, a wooded knoll just outside of Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania.
Residents contend that the groundhog has never been wrong.
The ceremony in Punxsutawney was held in secret until 1966, and only Phil’s prediction was revealed to the public. Since then, Phil’s fearless forecast has been a national media event.
The groundhog comes out of his electrically heated burrow, looks for his shadow and utters his prediction to a Groundhog Club representative in “groundhogese.” The representative then translates the prediction for the general public.
If Punxsutawney Phil sees his shadow, it means six more weeks of winter. If he does not see his shadow, it means spring is just around the corner.
Approximately 90% of the time, Phil sees his shadow.
Phil started making predictions in 1887 and has become an American institution.
> Despite years of recruitment efforts, Ridgewood has only a skeletal crew of volunteer firefighters. And since so few volunteer ambulance members are available during the day, firefighter EMTs respond to those calls.
Cutting in the area of public safety should be one of the last resorts. There is plenty of spending in this town that should be curtailed first. Buying property and equipment, planning parking garages, etc should be first on the chopping block.
I look at having a paid fire dept the way I look at insurance. You pay for it and hope you never need to use it, but when you do need it you are damn glad you have it. When I remember the Red Cross building fire and the West Side Pres fire, as well as a number of serious house fires, to name just a few, I shudder to think of what may have happened with fewer or volunteer firefighters.And we have a large hospital in this town! The other towns with large hospitals in this area all have paid departments, for good reason!!!
Also, keep in mind that many of the services that our FD provides, such as help pumping out flooded basements and some educational fire prevention programs, would not be provided by a smaller or volunteer dept.
The cost savings would be small and the potential problems would be large. I really feel messing with the fire dept is a big mistake.
>It seems that Ms. Goodman is right to be cautious about whether Ridgewood will ever see the $10 million dollars in matching funds from the state of NJ for our turf fields. We have it from a good source that Governor Corzine has refused to sign off on any school referendums. Which means that Ridgewood’s recently passed $48 million dollar bond referendum is in limbo awaiting the approval of incoming Governor Christie. Who, by the way, has made it abundantly clear that he is going to cut state spending.
So, if Governor Christie doesn’t sigh off on the recent school referendums, they will have to be voted on again. What do you think the chances are that our BOE can muster the 62 vote margin needed to pass this boondoggle of a bond again? If I were a bettin’ man, I’d say slim to none considering we ain’t gettin’ the $10 mill in matchin’ grant money from the new governor.
Watch how optimism turns to pessimism as our BOE grapples with this issue and a cash shortfall of close to $3 million in this year’s operating budget.
As we have said all along, this group at Cottage Place is in over its head… in every capacity. Thank goodness we have great principals who run our schools in spite of the BOE and its bloated administration.
The latest hangover remedy is asparagus, researchers say. According to “HealthDay News,” asparagus may help protect the liver and ease hangover symptoms.
A “Journal of Food Science” study also revealed that asparagus, a widely consumed vegetable eaten worldwide, has been used for its anti-cancer, anti-fungal, anti-inflammatory and diuretic effects.
Asparagus is not only a cure for hangovers, but it’s also a beneficial source of folic acid, potassium, fiber, Vitamin B6, Vitamins A and C and thiamin, according to the Michigan Asparagus Advisory Board.
Thankfully, there’s a cure for those nauseous, head-pounding mornings. You know, those nights when your stomach is in knots-when you just want to go back to sleep.
The next time you have a hangover, try one (or all, depending on how bad you feel) of these suggestions to help alleviate your hangover :
As reported in the Ridgewood News by Michael Sedon and Kipp Clark , attorney Stuart J. Lieberman, of Princeton-based Lieberman & Blecher, who represents the Preserve Graydon Group contends that a Nov. 16 letter written by Village Clerk Heather Mailander failed to answer the group’s concerns about why the village is taking all the information gathered by the RPP “at face value without reviewing them,” as well as questions why municipal employees have been made available to help the group. With these questions yet unanswered, Lieberman contends the RFP should never have been issued.
Liberman went on , “In short, the basis for my client’s concern is that the municipality has clearly and extensively relied on the work product of the RPP in creating the draft RFP, apparently taking its conclusions at face value and without reviewing them thoroughly or perhaps at all,” Lieberman wrote. “For reasons more fully explained in my letter dated to you Nov. 30, 2009, we believe the draft RFP violates state law.”
Once again Village Government business seems to be driven by the price of a particular project and not the value of the improvements the project will bring to the quality of life in the Village .
Again this blog was proven correct in its objections to the original $13 million dollar proposal because as Ms. Mailander clearly points out in her statements that the Village Council only seems interested in hearing what it wants to hear.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with what an amazing town Ridgewood used to be ,in the olds days had you pulled a stunt like this you would have been quietly asked to leave town in no uncertain terms and your house would have been put on the market the next day. It really was a beautiful place to live and no one would have ever put up with this type of behavior or even known someone would have even tried to get away with it . It just wont happen in Ridgewood.
Oh well …
I noticed that Laurie Goodman’s blog and the Ridgewood Patch both featured a report from REAC about the safety of the turf at Maple Park. The Patch even provided the report on its site. Goodman had a the link (https://ridgewoodreac.com/SustainableFields.html). I spent some time over the weekend going through this report. It is the most informative and objective I have seen on the topic. There were a number of things that I found surprising. It basically shows that the people, who have been critical of artificial turf for environmental or safety reasons have been wrong, at least at Maple Park. I was shocked to learn that the design actually has benefits for the flood plain.
This report is very timely with the referendum vote tomorrow. Why didn’t you feature this report on your blog? This is the kind of information I would expect you to bring to our attention. You let us down on this one.
New Jersey Patriots Are Taking their Voices to DC Again!
We are taking it to the “buses” on December 15th once again to provide our Senators the visual aid they need to understand clearly that we do not want this Healthcare bill on our backs or the backs of our children or grandchildren. We cannot afford, nor will we tolerate, another power grab by Congress to rule over our very own bodies and force upon us unconstitutional actions to compel us to buy or subsidize government healthcare in any shape or form.
Each year at this time school children all over America are taught the official Thanksgiving story, and newspapers, radio, TV, and magazines devote vast amounts of time and space to it. It is all very colorful and fascinating.
It is also very deceiving. This official story is nothing like what really happened. It is a fairy tale, a whitewashed and sanitized collection of half-truths which divert attention away from Thanksgiving’s real meaning.
The official story has the pilgrims boarding the Mayflower, coming to America and establishing the Plymouth colony in the winter of 1620-21. This first winter is hard, and half the colonists die. But the survivors are hard working and tenacious, and they learn new farming techniques from the Indians. The harvest of 1621 is bountiful. The Pilgrims hold a celebration, and give thanks to God. They are grateful for the wonderful new abundant land He has given them.
The official story then has the Pilgrims living more or less happily ever after, each year repeating the first Thanksgiving. Other early colonies also have hard times at first, but they soon prosper and adopt the annual tradition of giving thanks for this prosperous new land called America.
The problem with this official story is that the harvest of 1621 was not bountiful, nor were the colonists hardworking or tenacious. 1621 was a famine year and many of the colonists were lazy thieves.
In his ‘History of Plymouth Plantation,’ the governor of the colony, William Bradford, reported that the colonists went hungry for years, because they refused to work in the fields. They preferred instead to steal food. He says the colony was riddled with “corruption,” and with “confusion and discontent.” The crops were small because “much was stolen both by night and day, before it became scarce eatable.”
In the harvest feasts of 1621 and 1622, “all had their hungry bellies filled,” but only briefly. The prevailing condition during those years was not the abundance the official story claims, it was famine and death. The first “Thanksgiving” was not so much a celebration as it was the last meal of condemned men.
But in subsequent years something changes. The harvest of 1623 was different. Suddenly, “instead of famine now God gave them plenty,” Bradford wrote, “and the face of things was changed, to the rejoicing of the hearts of many, for which they blessed God.” Thereafter, he wrote, “any general want or famine hath not been amongst them since to this day.” In fact, in 1624, so much food was produced that the colonists were able to begin exporting corn.
What happened?
After the poor harvest of 1622, writes Bradford, “they began to think how they might raise as much corn as they could, and obtain a better crop.” They began to question their form of economic organization.
This had required that “all profits & benefits that are got by trade, working, fishing, or any other means” were to be placed in the common stock of the colony, and that, “all such persons as are of this colony, are to have their meat, drink, apparel, and all provisions out of the common stock.” A person was to put into the common stock all he could, and take out only what he needed.
This “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need” was an early form of socialism, and it is why the Pilgrims were starving. Bradford writes that “young men that are most able and fit for labor and service” complained about being forced to “spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children.” Also, “the strong, or man of parts, had no more in division of victuals and clothes, than he that was weak.” So the young and strong refused to work and the total amount of food produced was never adequate.
To rectify this situation, in 1623 Bradford abolished socialism. He gave each household a parcel of land and told them they could keep what they produced, or trade it away as they saw fit. In other words, he replaced socialism with a free market, and that was the end of famines.
Many early groups of colonists set up socialist states, all with the same terrible results. At Jamestown, established in 1607, out of every shipload of settlers that arrived, less than half would survive their first twelve months in America. Most of the work was being done by only one-fifth of the men, the other four-fifths choosing to be parasites. In the winter of 1609-10, called “The Starving Time,” the population fell from five-hundred to sixty.
Then the Jamestown colony was converted to a free market, and the results were every bit as dramatic as those at Plymouth. In 1614, Colony Secretary Ralph Hamor wrote that after the switch there was “plenty of food, which every man by his own industry may easily and doth procure.” He said that when the socialist system had prevailed, “we reaped not so much corn from the labors of thirty men as three men have done for themselves now.”
Before these free markets were established, the colonists had nothing for which to be thankful. They were in the same situation as Ethiopians are today, and for the same reasons. But after free markets were established, the resulting abundance was so dramatic that the annual Thanksgiving celebrations became common throughout the colonies, and in 1863, Thanksgiving became a national holiday.
Thus the real reason for Thanksgiving, deleted from the official story, is: Socialism does not work; the one and only source of abundance is free markets, and we thank God we live in a country where we can have them.
* * * * * Mr. Maybury writes on investments.
This article originally appeared in The Free Market, November 1985.
>I am currently watching the BoE meeting. The referendum came up. They discussed it for a total of FIVE minutes. Brogan said to come to the next public forum at GW on 11/30 to talk about the referendum. Goodman wanted to correct the record in TRW that BF would not be turfed. Hutton said if you want to know why there should be turf, just walk across Stevens field. Brogan(?) said (for a half-minute) that the referendum is more than just fields – and then the talk turned to turf again. Vallerini said that there is no way to change the referendum. (Then, what’s the point to discuss anything, as Brogan said at the opening, other than to push for a ‘yes’ vote)
It seems to me that the BoE wants you to come to the forums or BoE meetings so they can regulate/control the message. Some of the detractors of this blog seem afraid that we may develop an opinion without the proper spin applied by the BoE.
At least, I didn’t hear ‘lets do it for the kids’ once…yet!
>The original poster, exclaims at the surprise to the opposition of turf fields added in the education budget, refers didn’t believe turf fields issue would become a lightening rod of opposition to the budget. Another post referred to Ridgewood as being ‘anti-jock’, and yet said not surprised from previous opposition, as when they did Maple Park. So then if they already knew strong opposition exits, why attach the turf on the referendum? Hoping to slide it through. Separate it before it goes to poll. It should be dealt with separately. Period. You say you haven’t seen a boe budge ever defeated before? Been here long enough to say Yes, boe budgets have been defeated before. Defeated budget do and have sent a strong message.
Heads up, the opposition to turf fields, is not just a Ridgewood issue as you’d like people to believe. Statewide, in other towns, communities, and in other states, there also was, and has been the same opposition to turf fields. So, lets stop the negative accusation that the Ridgewood taxpayers are being just unreasonable, whether it be due to finances, or to their strong preference in wanting the real natural grass.
By the way, a previous post replied to a rotation replacement of turf fields question; by saying the rotation would be done with Maple when that time comes and that should satisfy the need for rotation replacement of fields, yet says the HS and Stevens fields would need to be done, installation at same time for cost savings. Not the answer I was looking for. IF there might be turf fields at HS and Stevens, those should be staggered years apart, so not to cause a big bite on the taxpayers down the road for replacement.
As far as Maple – that was not taxpayer dollars funded, as we all know. It was privately funded not costing the taxpayers a dime. It should not then fall in the lap and cost the taxpayers a dime either IF when it might need to be removed, disposed and IF replaced. The neighborhood kids that have played on both grass and turf, have told me last year, that they do prefer the grass, the turf is just an ‘ok’. No spin needed on the background of lack of play fields, etc., we all already are aware of whats been said. thank you. By the way, what happened to all that money that was saved by using turf at Maple? Last town budget was in the hole.
Have read that Christie plans, will be asking the state to perform audits on the costliest school districts to ensure the money is spent efficiently, in an attempt to uncover spending that doesn’t directly help educate students. Its reported his plan for reducing property taxes will target the costliest school districts in NJ to be held more accountable. Oh!-“fiscal responsiblity by the BOE”. He should read this blog, ha. Also read plans to eliminate positions in the DEP. Wait till he audits Ridgewood – stampede! They’ll be running for nearest exit. It’s also about time, haveing someone to stand up to the NJEA. If the teachers go on strike – so be it, they’ll be replaced, many waiting in the wings, things happen for the better, maybe its time.
Today was another perfect example of why the village needs the turf fields proposed in the BOE referendum. For the third time in six weeks, the RJFA was forced to cancel their Saturday flag football program due to over-saturtion of the fields at Vets. Families paid $75 per child for this program, which plays once a week on Saturday mornings from 8-9am. About 80 2nd and 3rd graders spend about 20 minutes going through basic skill drills and then spend the rest of the hour scrimaging against other teams of 5-6 within the program. This is a great introduction to football in a fun environment. Yet, the children have only been able to play 3 times this fall, due to rain the night before.
Our fields drain so poorly, that they cannot handle even modest amounts of rain, forcing the closure of fields and/or cancellation of sporting events that these children look forward to all week and parents spend several hundred to thousands of dollars for (esspecially when more than one child is involved).
So, while I would rather have grass fields in a “perfect world”, in the reality of Ridgewood today we need more fields like the one at Maple. These fields are safe and do not have “residue” (dangerous or otherwise) that comes off, as claimed in the post above. These fields would provide an environmental benefit by saving approximately 100,000 car tires from being placed in land-fills, avoiding thousands of pounds of fertilizer and chemicals from being deposited in the flood plain and saving hundreds of hours of mowing at each field each year. In addition, most kids prefer the synthetic surface for some reason.
Between last spring and this fall, over 30% of youth sports practices and games scheduled on Ridgewood fields (other than Maple) have been canceled or moved to Maple. That is simply unacceptable. If the BOE can build fields at Stevens and RHS that have the same aesthetic appeal of Maple, then I am strongly in favor of the proposal in the referendum.
>’a few hundred more a year’ includes families without kids, old and young. Without them, replace ‘a few hundred with a thousand’. Would you say ‘yes’ then?
Does the BOE realize that in tough financial times, it’s not prudent to install 3 turf fields? The same fields that were shot down during financially good times just a few years back? If you were spending your family’s money, would you run up your credit card for ‘wants’ versus ‘needs’ because the ‘wants’ were on sale?
Where have all the capital improvements reserves been during the last several decades? Have they gone to a bloated BOE office, easily conceded REA contracts or buildouts of schools when we already own a school we rent out? (read:redistricting)
Every day, I see cars dropping off kids with out of state plates in front of RHS. Have there been comprehensive residency checks to make sure our $14k/pupil is not being given away to out-of-towners? (This is on top of the teachers who bring their kids into district gratis, to boot)
No folks, the chickens really have come home. Cut the BS mantra about ‘doing it for the kids’. Maybe we could teach our kids a valuable lesson in austerity during hard times. It takes real courage not to be wasteful when it is much easier to cave in to union and elitist demands.
BOE – do the right thing. Bond only for what is needed and not a ‘fairytale wish list’. Going forward, more hard decisions must be made, and you are entrusted to be prudent during these times
>In a Friday, September 11, 2009 article,”Flooding concerns no longer a worry in Little Ferry” ,Kenneth Gabbert presented some ideas as to flooding issues in the town of Little Ferry ,perhaps since so many Village assets and resources are currently situated in flood zone’s maybe the VC thought it was finally time to start addressing this issue?
The unusually wet summer might’ve dampened many barbecues and vacations this past season, but Little Ferry officials are relieved that the high precipitation totals didn’t rain on their parade. In the past, the amount of rainfall in the area — more than 14 inches in June and July alone — would have likely resulted in major flooding, but improvements to drainage and pump stations have decreased the number of sticky, or in this case, wet situations.
“Since the addition of the three Losen Slote pump stations, the amount of flooding has been greatly reduced,” Borough Administrator Kenneth Gabbert said following last month’s mayor and council meeting, a session in which flooding issues emerged.
According to Gabbert, Little Ferry last suffered borough-wide flooding in 1992. Since then, only patches of flooding have appeared despite the fact that the entire municipality is in a 100-year flood plain.
The combination of high tide and heavy rain in a short period of time resulted in the 1992 flooding. At that time, pumps had not been installed to remove water.
“In contrast,” Gabbert said, “the 1999 Hurricane Floyd which devastated north and central New Jersey for weeks caused minor flooding in Little Ferry.”
Flooding has been limited because of the borough’s “aggressive” handling, including the addition of pump stations and maintenance of storm drains.
“On the rare occasions where basements take in water, the DPW and Fire Department are active with pumps,” Gabbert said, adding that the borough provides large garbage receptacles to collect any damaged items and debris and arranges special pickups.
