Valley sued the Village of Ridgewood claiming an unfair process in the deliberations. Many thousands of dollars was spent by groups opposed to the renewal and for very substantial and convincing reasons. New Jersey requires that we go through a mediation process, it does not require that either party has to accept the results.
Valley’s “compromise” includes a 1700 spot parking garage on the cornet of Linwood and Van Dien! We have spent years discussing an approx. 400 space parking garage on Hudson Street which is not in the middle of a neighborhood, next to a school and on one of the busiest corners in all of Ridgewood.
The planning board is duty bound to protect our village from over development not to appease an entity that has enough money to keep the battle on going. We have a Master Plan and zoning ordinances to protect us. If the Planning Board is wiling to change them in order to allow Valley to go ahead with its plan to almost double its size in the middle of a neighborhood, then we need a new Planning Board that is looking out for the Village of Ridgewood. I say village because many seem to have forgotten that .
We worry about signage that isn’t in keeping with our aesthetics. We tell businesses in town what colors they can use on their store fronts and yet we would consider a massive expansion in the middle of a residential area? Our priorities need an overhaul and there is no time to do it. The Planning Board is holding 5 hearings all within a few days of each other starting at the end of March and ending in early April and before an election in May which will change the council by 3 new members.
One of our current council members Gwen Hauck has stated in public that she is “beholden to Valley”. She should recuse herself from any vote on Valley and we may have the law on our side regarding a conflict of interest.
Ridgewood NJ, If anyone thinks that she should represent us in the law suit all you have to do is look up the minuets Sept 19 H-Z hearing and she what she said. Then you tel me.
Speaking before the council during the “H-Zone” hearings to determine the fate of ‘Renewal’, Hauck said on Sept. 19: “Also, I trust Audrey Meyers, Megan Fraser, all the doctors and volunteers I work with and all the spokespersons of the hospital when they tell me that the hospital will have better services and healthier surroundings if they modernize and expand the way they’ve laid out because they’re the health experts…and I believe them.”
While it may seem unlikely a perfect solution will ever emerge, Hauck stressed a “healthy” and “reasonable” dialogue must emerge for any meaningful change to happen.
Ms. Hauck also signed this letter. Do you still thing she should represent us in the Valley Hospital law suit?
An Open Letter to Fellow Residents of Ridgewood and the Ridgewood Planning Board, As residents of Ridgewood, we write to share our thoughts about The Valley Renewal
.
We are among the thousands of Village residents who support
Renewal
.
To continue to be the high quality hospital that residents of Ridgewood and our neighboring
communities need and desire, it is essential for Valley to renew. Valley must right-size its
operating, diagnostic, and treatment rooms to accommodate new technologies and procedures.
It is also essential for Valley to develop single patient rooms to meet new patient care and
safety standards. These steps are not optional, they are crucial.
During its almost 60-year history, Valley has evolved from a local hospital to the award
winning, top quality regional healthcare organization that it is today. The hospital ranks
among the highest in the nation for both clinical care and patient satisfaction. It has evolved
over time to meet the needs of the communities it serves, and it must do so again. Valley’s
role as a provider of excellent healthcare services for tens of thousands is what makes the
suggested revisions to the Master Plan and H Zone not only acceptable, but vital.
As residents of Ridgewood, we disagree with those who have written or stated that
the Hospital’s
Renewal
will harm the unique character or way of life of the Village.
In addition, we believe that Valley is wholly committed to the safety and security of the
hospital’s patients, its staff, and the neighbors and students who live and attend school
in the hospital’s neighborhood.
We are proud of The Valley Hospital and we know the majority of our neighbors feel the
same way. As friends and neighbors of many Village residents, we suggest that we move
past the “us vs. them” mentality that has unfortunately become a part of this discussion
and move toward ensuring that Valley remains the hospital that all of us would choose for
ourselves and our family’s healthcare, today, tomorrow, and in the future.
Sincerely,
Scott Agins, D.P.M.
Claudia Allocco
Andrea Aluisi
Michael W. Azzara
George Becker, M.D.
Timothy Berry
David F. Bolger
Mary Camerlingo
Tracey Carbone, M.D.
Eugene Cornell
Anne G. Crane
Thomas R. Crane
Charles D. Crowley, M.D.
Elizabeth O. Crowley, M.D.
Bettina M. Daly
Anne Raftery Denyeau
Marc M. Dreier, M.D.
Stephen J. Errico
Kevin M. Fee
Carole E. Forenza
Russell R. Forenza
James D. Fraser
Megan Fraser
Danielle M. Gaglioti
Robin L. Giordano
Robert Gutenstein
Gwenn Hauck
Cynthia Halaby
Diana Hock
Fletcher Hock
John Johansen
Sally Jones
John Kandravy
Leslie Kane
Sue Kelly
Maryann LeBert
Edward and Joan Lefferman
Kenneth Levitsky, M.D.
Hugo Lijtmaer, M.D.
David Lipson, M.D.
Donna H. MacPhee
Gail M. Matthews, M.D.
Susan H. Mayo
Diane Meissner
Klaus J. Meissner
Audrey Meyers
David Namerow, M.D.
John Nasr, M.D.
Ali Nasseri, M.D.
Pat and Mario Perillo
Thomas J. Rakowski, M.D.
Eileen Richardot
Bettie and Howell Rile
Marivic F. Santiago, M.D.
Kathleen B. Sayles
David G. Sayles
Maria Scibetta, M.D.
Marjorie L. Slankard, M.D.
Ann Marie Snyder
Charles J. Snyder
Susan J. Snyder
Jack Tohme, M.D.
Daniel Van Engel, M.D.
Wayne A. Yankus, M.D.
Patricia J. Van Dyke
Victoria Van Dyke
Susan Viniar
Michael Wesson, M.D
Ridgewood NJ, Ridgewood high density housing issue is upon us again. The Village Council will be meeting at the Campus Center of the Ridgewood High School.
The Village Council Meetings of March 23rd ,Work Session meeting will begin at 7:30 p.m.During the Work Session there will be a Special Public Meeting for the Public Hearings and vote on the multi-family housing ordinances as well as a public hearing and vote on the bond ordinance to appropriate money for the Hudson Street parking deck.
The meetings will be filmed and available both on YouTube and the Village Public Access Channel (Cablevision 77; Fios 37) the following day. According to a March 10th update “streaming on YouTube from this location on March 9th proved successful and will be again be done for the March 23rd meeting.
According to the previous meeting the high density housing will have “No impact” on traffic, schools, water ,sewers in the Village .
The current council majority know on this blog as the three amigos , have all declined to run for reelection for various reasons , so the fate of the Village of Ridgewood will be settled by parties who are no longer vested in the Village.
YARD WASTE COLLECTION BEGINS APRIL 11 – PLEASE ADHERE TO SCHEDULE
Ridgewood Nj , Yard Waste season will start on April 11th in Area A. Please do not place any yard waste (branches or twigs) at the curb until your date for yard waste collection begins. The schedule is printed in the 2016 Village Calendar. The Village is divided into four areas and collection takes place at the curb following that schedule. The Recycling Center on E. Glen Avenue will take yard waste now if you want to drop it off. For further questions, please call 201/670-5585.
Ridgewood Nj, last nights meeting seem to resemble more of a trip to the land of make believe than serious planning for Ridgewood’s Future . Readers claim it was a complete farce. Once again. They did not allow any public members to question the experts behind the studies. The experts described the developments in butterflies and rainbows terms and could only see positive impacts. Farce.
One expert boldly stated , NO impact from high density housing. Yep. He really said that.
One of the highlights of the evening for Gwenn Hauck was when she referred to resident Dana Glazer’s GoPro harness as resembling a ‘terrorist.’ That was fun.
RIDGEWOOD, N.J.– Ramon M. Hache, 41, is certified to run for one of the three open seats on the Ridgewood Village Council in this May 10th municipal election. Hache, a father of three, sees a need for responsible, balanced leadership to propel Ridgewood forward while respecting its residents.
“I see Ridgewood standing at the crossroads of progress and tradition, and I know that a lot of big decisions will have to be made in the next few years,” Hache said. “I want to make sure that the town is guided through those decisions in a responsible way. To me this next election will provide an important reset for the town.”
Some of the big issues Ridgewood is facing in the future will be a continued push for multi-familyhousing, Valley Hospital, safety surrounding schools and the cost of maintaining and enhancing our athletic fields and parks.
Although the Master Plan was recently updated, Hache feels that it is important to revisit thisdocument, which should provide a detailed roadmap to the future and offer guidelines for smart development.
A 1991 graduate of Ridgewood High School, Hache was raised in the Village, and he is currently SeniorVice President at Permal Group, one of the largest hedge fund investors in the world.
Hache’s volunteerism includes being the treasurer for the Ridgewood High School Football Scholarship Committee, a Ridgewood Soccer Association coach, a member of the Knights of Columbus and an active member, lector and Eucharistic minister at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church.
To contact Ramon Hache: 201-960-4977, [email protected], or visit www.ramonhache.com
I am writing to inform you of a Municipal Information Forum that we will be hosting for Ridgewood residents regarding Ridgewood Water.
The intent of this forum is to educate the public on how water is delivered to your faucet. We will deal with current issues in the news as well as discussing the quality of our water, sustaining water for the future, budget and capital investments and our short-term and long-term strategies.
Our decision to hold this forum emanated from several sources. One clearly is the amount of interest that residents have expressed in learning more about Ridgewood Water; this has definitely been heightened by stories in the news. Secondly, we have held two sessions such as these at both our 2016 budget reviews as well as at a Glen Rock Council meeting. These were two-way dialogues that were well received and I believe went a long way in a better mutual understanding of how the water we consume is delivered to our homes.
We are planning on conducting this forum on two separate dates. The first isThursday April 21st from 9-11 AM. The other is Monday April 25th from 7:30-9:30PM.
Please let us know if you intend on joining us by responding to this e-notice.
Look forward to seeing you.
Best,
Roberta Sonenfeld
Village Manager
201-670-5500, ext. 203
RIDGEWOOD DOWNTOWN ZONING ANALYSIS STUDIES
The Final Downtown Zoning Impacts Analysis that address the four multifamily housing study areas is now available. For the complete document Click Here
Our mayor has brought this village to this state of division and havoc. He is a man who only gets along with those that agree with him, look at his track record of former and current council members. This village never needed a civil committee before his arrival! When you don’t agree with him, he attacks and becomes aggressive and vindictive. Pitting clergy against clergy; neighbor against neighbor; lying to voters; calling hours at the podium where residents plead for a voice in the process a discussion; using committees to prop up your projects all the while lying to them; hiding information from other council members; hiring a VM to do your bidding; calling residents liars; and the ongoing scheming and plotting how subjects and issues will be brought up on the dais have brought us to this ugly chapter. These examples are just from the last 6 months….And people like this guy? I guess the ones who will make a buck off his “leadership” do! I don’t understand how anyone can defend or support someone like him. Scary! July 1st can’t come fast enough!
MLS # 1535930
456 E Saddle River Rd, Ridgewood, NJ 07450
3 Bedroom, 2 Full Bath,
1 Half Bath, Ranch Thomas Panso, Sales Associate Keller Williams Valley Realty
Ridgewood NJ, The Ridgewood Police Department is pleased to announce the 2016 Chief Michael Feeney Jr.Police Academy will be held June 23rd to July 1st at the Benjamin Franklin Middle School. Applications will be available April 1st at the Ridgewood Police desk. The seven day academy sponsored by Ridgewood PBA Local 20 is open to Ridgewood residents entering 6th 7th and 8th grades in the fall of 2016. Visit the Ridgewood Police Website for more information.
For those of you who have watched the 2016 budget work sessions, one of the highlights (or actually lowlights) that was discussed is the state of recycling in Ridgewood today. This is by no means a problem unique to Ridgewood.
Our curbside recycling program began in 1991. We ask our residents to separate their recycling into different streams and to use the beige recycling barrels that we provide to you. We sell our recycling products to processors and in the past have collected enough fees to significantly help in offsetting the expense of running this program. The level of fees is under siege and has actually decreased 18% over the last 3 years from $332,552 to $266,232; a further decline is anticipated in 2016.
This is not a Ridgewood-specific challenge. Based on global issues, predominantly the China crackdown dubbed Green Fence, recycling processors are finding it increasingly difficult to supply China, a major global recycling processing center, with recycling products. China is rejecting containers of waste it deems are contaminated or are not sorted appropriately.
Which brings us back to our challenge in Ridgewood……
Our recycling processor has, with little notice, tightened their standards for the product that we provide to them. We therefore must provide the recycling processor with the most pristine product that we can – this means that it is so very important that we improve the quality of our recyclables.
One particular problem is the inclusion of plastic bags with your recycling – this is not allowed. When mixed in with other recycling, plastic bags get caught in the machinery at the recycling plant at times causing the facility to shut down their sorting equipment to manually remove entangled bags. When the processor has to manually separate this material from our stream, the Village loses revenue and pays for the disposal of the material as garbage. Not intermixing plastic bags with your recycling has always been a rule since the inception of our recycling program but has not been strictly enforced because the market was accepting the product without question. Plastic bags must be placed in your trash or recycled at Stop & Shop, Whole Foods Market and Acme.
Besides not intermixing plastic bags with your recycling, you can help us even more by following good recycling practice which you can find either in the 2016 Green Guide that was mailed to your home earlier this year or on our Recycling Website or by calling us at 201-670-3373.
I have touched on the Ridgewood economic challenges above……but a crucial point is that recycling is good for our world…..this should be reason enough for us to try to do better as a community. We have also challenged our recycling team to come up with new and different ways to enhance our program. As usual, we would love to hear your ideas on this – I know that we have many residents who are passionate about this issue.
We look forward to working with you on this effort.
Best,
Roberta Sonenfeld
Village Manager
201-670-5500, ext. 203
Ridgewood NJ Just a few points about the March 2nd Village meeting:
1. Albert sent an email to a resident during the meeting. This is strictly forbidden according to a resolution that he himself penned, as follows:
Resolution 13-87 (April 24, 2013), item #4 reads as follows:
Telephonic or electronic communication between or among Councilmembers or between a Councilmember and a member of the public during public meetings is prohibited.
As soon as he realized his gaffe, Albert made a big point of saying that this is THE FIRST TIME EVER that he has sent an email during a meeting to a “member of the public” other than his family. Evidently colleagues on the dais and members of his family are not considered to be members of the public. Or, maybe the Deputy Mayor considers himself to be above his own rules.
2. The Deputy Mayor got nasty with a member of the public who questioned the accuracy of one of the renditions of the new garage plan. The resident had not only questioned the depiction, but had also questioned whether this misrepresentation might have been intentional. Mr. Pucciarelli referred to the resident’s email as STUPID and announced that he deleted it immediately. Instead of actually looking at the resident’s suggestions, he just discarded it and then was insulting about it.
3. They voted 5-0 to go forward with bonding in-town, which will be a final hearing on the 23. They voted 2 in favor (Susan and Michael) and 3 opposed to killing the ordinance to bond with the BCIA. Aronsohn made it abundantly clear that he will barrel ahead with the BCIA if the in-town bonding does not go through. So the terrible three are keeping “parallel” tracks open so they can get the garage one way or another.
Ridgewood NJ, Get up to speed on the latest details released from the Village on the proposed parking garage on Hudson Street.
DESMAN HUDSON STREET DECK DRAWINGS – 1/29/2016
These drawings represent the site plan, floor plan & building sections for the revised design of the Deck at Hudson Street. This Deck design was first considered in October 2015. There will be 325 parking spots. The height to the roof is approx. 43′ and 46′ 8″ to the parapet. Click Here for Drawings
This document produced by BCIA Professionals contrasts BCIA County Guaranteed Financing with Village of Ridgewood Stand Alone Financing for debt associated with the Parking Deck Project. Please note that the estimated differential between the two scenarios has changed since last week, due to changes in BCIA issuance costs amended by the BCIA on Friday, January 29, 2016. Now, there is an estimated differential of $22,248 which averages less than $900 per year. Click Here for the document.
Ridgewood NJ , correct me if I am wrong is this not a violation of the Faulkner Act, the Village of Ridgewood was established as a non partisan town . Why is the mayor promoting partisan politics?
The Optional Municipal Charter Law or Faulkner Act (N.J.S.A. § 40:69A-1, et seq.) provides New Jersey municipalities with a variety of models of local government. This legislation is called the Faulkner Act in honor of the late Bayard H. Faulkner, former mayor of Montclair, New Jersey and chairman of the Commission on Municipal Government.
The Faulkner Act offers four basic plans (mayor–council, council–manager, small municipality, and mayor–council–administrator) and two procedures by which the voters of a municipality can adopt one of these plans. The Act provides many choices for communities with a preference for a strong executive and professional management of municipal affairs. Twenty-one percent of the municipalities in New Jersey, including the six most populous cities (Newark, Jersey City, Camden, Trenton, Paterson and Elizabeth) all govern under the provisions of the Faulkner Act. More than half of all New Jersey residents reside in municipalities with Faulkner Act charters. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faulkner_Act )
Ridgewood is governed within the Faulkner Act (formally known as the Optional Municipal Charter Law) under Council-Manager plan B, as implemented on July 1, 1970, by direct petition.[46] Under this form, the governing body consists of five council members who are responsible to hire and oversee a professional Village Manager who has full executive power for all departments. The government consists of five council members, with all positions elected at-large in nonpartisan elections to serve four-year terms on a staggered basis, with either two or three seats coming up for election in even-numbered years on the second Tuesday in May. At a reorganization meeting held on July 1 after newly elected council members take office, the council chooses a mayor and deputy mayor from among its members, with the mayor presiding over Council meetings, but without any executive authority.[6] The Village Council appoints a Village Manager to oversee the day to day operations of the Village, to handle personnel, citizen inquiries and complaints, and to handle the administrative duties of the Village. The Village Council passes local laws, makes appointments to various Boards and Committees, and awards various contracts for purchases of goods and services used by the Village. They also review, amend, and adopt the annual budget for the Village prepared by the Village Manager and Chief Financial Officer. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ridgewood,_New_Jersey )
COUNTY COMMITTEE PETITIONS AVAILABLE
Petitions for County Committee are available in the Village Clerk’s Office. County Committee members represent their political party in each voting district, and they vote at the convention for the County Officials. There are two County Committee members for the Democratic party and two County Committee members for the Republican party from each voting district, one male and one female. The candidates running for County Committee must run to represent the voting district in which they reside. The petitions must be signed by voters in the same voting district and be of the same political party as the candidates. County Committee members are voted on in the Primary Election. The deadline to submit completed County Committee petitions to the Village Clerk’s Office is April 4, 2016 at 4:00 P.M. (https://www.ridgewoodnj.net/news/672-county-committee-petitions-available )
