file photo by Boyd Loving
Chapter 3. Administration of Government
Article II. Village Council
§ 3-19. Manner of addressing Council.
[Amended 1-11-1994 by Ord. No. 2442]
A.
Persons other than Council members may be permitted to address the Council in the proper order of business. A person present may, upon recognition by the Chair, be heard either upon ordinances upon second reading or at the time of petitions and oral communications from the public and at such other times as the Council may, by majority vote of those present, specifically permit. No person shall address any remark or question to any specific Council member, nor shall any person be permitted to address the Chair while a motion is pending. A Council member may, through the Chair, respond to any communication or address received pursuant to this section.
B.
Except upon consent of the Council, by the majority vote of those present, each person addressing the Council pursuant to this section shall be required to limit his remarks to five minutes and shall at no time engage in any personally offensive or abusive remarks. On a hearing on ordinances on second reading, a person who has previously addressed the Council on the issue may be permitted a period of no more than an additional five minutes, after all others desirous of speaking on the issue have had an opportunity to do so, provided the comments of the speaker are not repetitive. The Chair shall call any speaker to order who violates any provision of this section.
My suggestion would be to prepare a 5-minute comment and use the entire time allotted. Bring a clock and respectfully remind the chair and/or council that you entitled to your 5-minutes and to please not interrupt.
Ridgewood NJ, Some of us are having trouble understanding what appear to be a contradiction in the actions and statements of Mayor Aronsohn, Deputy Mayor Pucciarelli, and Councilwoman Hauck. For the record, I pointed this out twice at public meetings (which did not result in an explanation of the discrepancy), and recently wrote to each of them for clarification (none replied).
In January of 2014, all three of them seemed pretty adamant that they did not want to violate the Village Code by hiring anyone into a position that did not exist (in that case, it was police officer positions in excess of the stated limit). Quotes from the Minutes of the 01/29/2014 meeting include the following:
Mayor Aronsohn pointed out that the most important question to be answered is whether the Village is now in violation of what is permitted by the ordinance as far as police hires are concerned. Mayor Aronsohn commented that the concerns are twofold: one is that the Village would not be in compliance with its own law, leading to the question of how to remedy that situation;
Councilwoman Hauck sees the current problem as an administrative problem and how it would appear if the ordinance were changed to facilitate an administrative error. She suggested that it might be better to wait until the next round of Police Academy candidates graduate, and hire new police officers in July. That would avoid being in violation of Village Code. Councilwoman Hauck said she feels uneasy about amending the current ordinance in order to bring people in prematurely.
Councilman Pucciarelli said that….for him, the issue is law enforcement, and the Village must obey its own laws.
How, then, do these statements fit in with their more recent actions regarding the hiring of a Human Resources Director (or Confidential Secretary, Senior Personnel Assistant, Senior Human Resources Professional or whatever the job title turned out to be) prior to the creation of this position and its official inclusion in the Village Code? It seemed that in January of 2014 they were determined to follow the letter of the law, whereas in the this situation they decided it was acceptable to completely disregard the Village Code, and then re-write it after doing so.
Certainly the creation of an HR position was not an emergency, and due process could have been followed to first create the position and have it officially entered into the Village Code, and then to advertise the job and hire the appropriate person. Our elected officials are put into office with a clear expectation that they will uphold the laws of our Village, in addition to their other duties. It strikes me that in the case of this Human Resources position, they openly disregarded their own law, even when such was being pointed out to them by Councilman Sedon, Councilwoman Knudsen, and various members of the public. No matter how badly they wanted a Human Resources person, the end does not justify the means. We have a set of laws and procedures, and we expect our elected officials to follow them.
Until the Mayor, Deputy Mayor, and Councilwoman Hauck clearly state why they acted one way in one instance, and quite the opposite in this instance, we taxpayers will be left feeling very uneasy.
As a 22 year Ridgewood resident I am disgusted by these three and Roberta. Cleaning the leaves is not a measure of good management. VM stated she doesn’t understand civil service so what are we paying her for? The love fest with these three and Roberta has crossed the line and has got to stop. They are uncivil to councilwoman Knudsen and treat her terribly. I am grateful for her decency and hard work. Knudsen should have the full support of Village residents and the three with Roberta should feel the wrath of the people.
What an utter mess our well-meaning and diligent public servants have made, in absolute good faith, with all appropriate due diligence, and deserving of no blame or negative consequences of any kind, with the exception of a nearly unintelligible but unmistakably nasty and inappropriately personal and emotion-laden tongue-lashing of Ms. Knudsen by Ms. Hauck! (/s)
This is a perfect example of how abruptly the rules of civility will be tossed out the window when the righteous scorn is to be delivered by one of the Three Amigos to a non-Amigo.
After you listen to Susan – and to Gwenn’s idiotic response……then slide ahead on the UStream to public comments and listen to Boyd’s comments at 1:24:34. He very emphatically ripped into them. And then our mayor had the audacity to attack Boyd (which he quickly backed off on) and then Paul went on to attack Susan during Boyd’s comments. Wow, Susan really struck paydirt and the dirty secrets are being revealed. THANK YOU SUSAN
I saw it live last night. Hauck sounded like a rude child who got caught doing something they shouldn’t have been doing. He Hauck, did you miss the point of the entire discussion; certainly seems like it. I love it when Susan says “well, just let me address that” repeatedly. And then when Roberta says “well. I hate to do this to you Susan” and then throws out a nothing-burger and Susan shoots her down with a solid response. . PRICELESS.
Susan comes to the meeting well informed and well prepared. I agree she is articulate and assertive in a polite and meaningful fashion.
And Boyd, you keep doing Boyd.
Last week Councilman Pucciarelli told Councilwoman Knudsen that “It’s not always about you” and “Don’t flatter yourself.” I look forward to hearing how this was civility at its best. In fact, that was a rude, condescending, contemptuous way to speak to anyone, much less a fellow council member on the dais during a council meeting. That arrogant, narcissistic misogynist MUST GO if he is so foolish as to run for reelection to the Village Council next spring. His outbursts are pointless, counterproductive, ego driven, and embarrassing both to him personally and to our Village government.
Here is an ironic twist. Aronsohn speaks of TRANSPARENCY and CIVILITY until the words have lost their meaning. And yet we have NONTRANSPARENCY and INCIVILITY under his reign of terror. Knudsen and Sedon are doing their level best to restore transparency and civility – but until we get rid of Aronsohn that won’t happen.
MAYOR’S OFFICE HOURS FOR RESIDENTS -Saturday, April 4 from 9 AM to Noon
Mayor Paul Aronsohn holds office hours for Ridgewood residents the first Saturday of every month. Mayor Aronsohn will meet with residents on Saturday, April 4 from 9AM to Noon in the Council Chambers (Sydney V. Stoldt, Jr. Court Room) on the fourth floor of Ridgewood Village Hall.
For an appointment to meet with the Mayor, please call the Village Clerk’s Office at 201-670-5500 ext. 206. You may come to the Mayor’s office hours without an appointment, but those with appointments will be given priority.
Civility Forum – May 11th at 7:30PM
The next Civility Forum will be held at 7:30pm in the Senior Lounge at Village Hall.
Rev. Jan Phillips will lead the discussion. Everyone is welcome to attend.
First Councilwoman Susan Knudsen was told to recuse herself from a closed meeting on this subject at the suggestion of the Village Manager and now information was withheld from her about this same subject.What the hell is going on in Village Hall. Who is the employee that contact Civil Service and who directed this employee to do this, Why can’t Councilwoman Susan Knudsen have that information. Why didn’t the attorney contact the Councilwoman and speak to her about this issue instead of directing another Village employee to withhold the information. WHO IS RUNNIG THE VILLAGE OF RIDGEWOOD.?
The circumstance described by Ms. Knudsen demonstrates that public matters are being discussed, and decisions made, by a majority of the council in advance of the public meeting during which the discussions and decisions are supposed to take place on the record. This reduces the public meeting to the status of a charade, because the result desired by the majority has already been determined in advance! As we all had suspected, it now appears clear that the Sunshine Law has been violated. Violations of the Sunshine Law don’t just happen–they are usually undertaken when the majority wants to avoid scrutiny for something they wish to do that the public might find odious. We all owe Ms. Knudsen a debt of gratitude for sticking to her guns and airing this issue out publicly.
