Ridgewood NJ, Why does the Ridgewood Library have to close on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day? The BCCLS site doesn’t even list those days as library holidays, and they certainly are not. On the Ridgewood Library’s own website, it says May 14th/Sunday/MOTHER’S DAY and June 18th/Sunday/FATHER’S DAY (Maroons Soccer Tournament).” (Actually, it says “Maroon’s”–sadly illiterate for a library. There is only one Maroon?)
What’s the connection–the library has to close because it is ceding the entire parking lot to attendees at a sports event? Does everybody in town care about sports AT ALL? I assure you, they do not.
Here’s the link. It says 2016, but the listings on the page are correct for this year. Somebody failed to update the URL.
As the first individual stated, crossing guards are not allowed to direct traffic. And sure, it is frustrating to be a guard and see traffic piling up and you are not allowed to direct it. Imagine if the guard directed a car and another car started to go and hit the first car. An insurance nightmare! The Police in Ridgewood are gradually being allowed to build up their department which will then free up a guard or two for traffic control near the schools. However, as the above poster noted, when the police are there, traffic behaves so well. But the very next day, the wild men take over the wheels. Hire auxiliary people trained in directing traffic to aid the crossing guards–one for cars, one for students? That would be cheaper than assigning police to every dangerous crosswalk. (Many are very safe locations and many are not.) But, again, it would probably be an insurance nightmare. Wouldn’t it be nice if all drivers were willing to recognize that other drivers also had a right to the road; that most of the cars dropping off at schools are parents who have to get to work at the same time that you do, etc.etc. What ever happened to common courtesy and treating others as you wished to be treated?
Trenton NJ ,The Department of Education today released the 2017 Taxpayers’ Guide to Education Spending.
“The annual spending guide is a tool designed to provide transparency to New Jerseyans about how schools spend their taxpayer dollars to educate students,” said Acting Education Commissioner Kimberley Harrington.
The Taxpayers’ Guide to Education Spending includes two types of total expenditures for school districts’ annual budgets:
Total Spending Per Pupil – Comprises all district expenditures, including costs paid by the state on behalf of districts, as well as fees and tuition paid for out-of-district programs; and
Budgetary Cost Per Pupil – Comprises costs borne by the school district, excluding costs that aren’t comparable among school districts, such as transportation and facilities costs.
For the 2015-16 school year, the average Total Spending Per Pupil in the state, which includes pension payments made by the state and other ancillary costs that vary by district, is $20,385. This is 3.8 percentage points higher than the prior year’s average of $19,641.
The Budgetary Cost Per Pupil, which does not include pension payments made by the state and other district-specific costs, increased by 1.4 percentage points, from $14,736 in the 2014-15 school year to $14,939 in 2015-16.
The Taxpayers’ Guide to Education Spending can be found online
Remember that the former Mayor and Mr. Saraceno conducted studies that showed that there would be LESS traffic and only 4 additional children in the schools as a result of this project. No really, they did – and expected us to believe it. The studies assumed that only empty nesters with no cars would be moving in to these apartments. They further assumed that apartment dwellers would simply walk to get everything they needed in Ridgewood and take the train everywhere else. What could possibly go wrong by trusting a real estate developer and a disgraced politician?
Ridgewood Mayor Susan Knudsen’s photo
April 17,2017
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, A loving and deserving Ridgewood family in the “George to the Rescue” spotlight today! Congratulations to the England family and may their beautiful home always be filled with much love and happiness!
https://www.facebook.com/GeorgeToTheRescue/
NBC’s George to the Rescue. We pair George up with contractors and designers to Rescue the homes of deserving people.
Know someone that needs a Rescue? Send an email to George@NBC.com
Seven low income housing units are planned for the Chestnut Avenue development that was just approved. How the heck does Ridgewood make any sort of real dent in its preposterous court-imposed low income housing deficit, seven units at a time?
Judicial fiat in any area of life over a time span measured in decades is utter lunacy. In this case it constitutes a naked denial to New Jersey citizens of their right under the U.S. Constitution to a republican (small ‘r’) form of government. The Municipal Law course at Rutgers Newark offered at the turn of the millenium featured a hands-upturned, shoulders-shrugged admission of all of the above by the part-time prof and active municipal law practitioner (who, of course, supported the system despite its unconstitutionality, but why? Because the prof was a reliablly progressive statist drone who agreed with the POLICY!).
The issue of affordable housing is based on a NJ Supreme Court decision over 10 years ago that requires EVERY municipality in the state to provide affordable housing in their community. The towns then essentially passed that burden along to developers who wished to build new housing units in their community by requiring that a percentage of the new units be dedicated to affordable housing. Nonetheless the legal obligation to provide affordable housing ultimately rests with the municipality and not developers..
It doesn’t. The way the ‘settlement’ has been structured, it never will.The settlement isn’t designed to address low income housing availability. It is designed as a club developers can hold over the heads of affluent communities. No prizes for guessing who the driving force behind the settlement was.
If they REALLY cared about affordable housing, they would insist that developers build 100% affordable housing, instead of giving ‘credit’ for a few units in a giant multifamily building. But there the $$$$$ are just not there for developing pure affordable housing, you see!
The part I can’t understand is that to get the seven we have to get a lot more of the “non-low-income” kind, thereby increasing the proportion of those. At that rate, the more affordable units we build, the farther behind we’ll get. By the way, Aronsohn promised the disabled community that he would make sure appropriate housing became available. Why isn’t his name invoked when complaints are made that Ridgewood needs this? No–instead, he’s thanked.
That was the fallacy and lunacy of the Mayor Arohnson approach – – the last council approved close to 400 new family units downtown with only a small percentage addressing our coah requirements. But, the new council does not seem any more intent on doing what we need to do in a rationale manner. Now we have these new units going forward, our schools and other village services will be innundated with new people and we still have the problem we had before — where do we put hundreds of new coah units??
Ridgewood NJ, The New Jersey Department of Education ( NJDOE) has posted its School Performance Report for the 2015-16 school year.
As in previous years, the report allows visitors to view the academic performance of any district or any school by grade level. The report also includes a broad array of information not included in past years.
According to the NJDOE website :The New Jersey Department of Education (NJDOE) presents the 2015-16 School Performance Reports. These reports are designed to inform parents, educators and communities about how well a school is performing and preparing its students for college and careers. In particular, the School Performance Reports seek to:
Focus attention on metrics that are indicative of college and career readiness.
Benchmark a school’s performance against other schools that are educating similar students, against district and state-wide outcomes, and against state targets to illuminate and build upon a school’s strengths and identify areas for improvement.
Improve educational outcomes for students by providing both longitudinal and growth data so that progress can be measured as part of an individual school’s efforts to engage in continuous improvement.
The latest report provides data on faculty attendance, absenteeism, PSAT and ACT performance in addition to SAT scores, advanced placement and international baccalaureate counts, and the percentage of students concentrating in approved career and technical education programs.
However the report no longer provides “peer school comparisons,” however, which compared each school’s data to a group of similar schools.
For Ridgewood High School “Academic Achievement” : School wide Performance 72% of students met or exceeded expectations in English Language Arts Literacy Met or Exceeded Expectations putting RHS in the 91% Statewide Percentile.In Mathematics 71% of students met or exceeded expectations putting RHS in the 99% Statewide Percentile.
For College and Career Readiness Indicators , Percent of Students Participating in PSAT , RHS 64.4% vs Statewide 95.5% .
Percent of Students Participating in SAT ,RHS 42.4% vs Statewide 58.0% .
Percent of Students Participating in ACT ,RHS 58.4% vs Statewide 27.6%.
Ridgewood NJ, During Wednesday evening’s Village Council Work Session, Village Engineer Christopher Rutishauser was asked to ascertain the feasibility of adding approximately 40 additional parking spaces at the Ridgewood train station. Mayor Susan Knudsen suggested that additional parking spaces might be added by removing the large, grass & tree covered center island in the current parking lot.
The fact is Ridgewood commuters need the parking, and this is a small price to pay along with perhaps a smaller far less ambitious parking facility on Hudson street.
The reality is that on weekends and during large events ,such as the Ridgewood Chamber of Commerce car show there is not enough parking.
After extensive observations the Ridgewood blog concludes it is going to take a multi-pronged effort to create viable solutions for the Village . The fact is everyone is going to have to give something.
1) First we need to get as many commuters off the Street of the central business district as possible . Parking for Commuters needs to be a minimum of 12 hours . This can be done by creating more parking at the train station and the bus station but also by using more carpooling , uber etc..and dare we say a massive increase in bicycle parking to get people to their point of departure.
2) Employees in the central business district MUST park in the allocated employee parking spaces . Lack of use of the designated spaces is egregious . We suggest a carefully coordinated ticket blitz to encourage compliance .
3) Instead of increasing fees for parking meter rates , increase meter hours so that restaurant patrons can relieve some of the burden from merchants .
4) The Valet parking seems to cause more trouble than its worth unless the cars are parked clearly offsite ,like Graydon pool lot in the evenings.
5) For their part the Ridgewood blog would suggest merchants pick some night during the week to stay open late so someone who actually has a competitive job could consider shopping in the central business district . We are convinced that the only stores that can thrive and survive in the current climate are those that make them selves destination retailers.
6) Finally access to the central business district which no one is talking about is a far bigger issue than parking . The traffic easing project under the train trestle has vitally cut off the West side of town from the East side. Not to mention the danger imposed by slowing response time for emergency vehicles .
The garage on Hudson will create major traffic congestion , while Linwood Ave and Ridgewood Ave remain the only viable way to get in and out of town. Approaches from the west side ,Godwin and West Ridgewood Ave are now all most impassable , however the approach from Prospect Street seems very under utilized.
For Westsiders if you add the current issues on Glenwood road , it far faster and easier to go to Midland Park, Wyckoff , Allendale and other towns north to shop than head to down town Ridgewood.
The Ridgewood blogs observations have concluded that not only is their not enough parking during peak hours ,but changes in vehicular traffic are literal choking off commerce to the Central Business District .
Ridgewood NJ, while Ridgewood residents were pretty happy with the Village response to Stella, a readers sentiments were that ” All the roads could use salt! Even schools are sheets of ice and still mounds of snow. Sidewalks not cleared. Should have been no school today too. Just sayin.” Many also felt the schools could have done a better job with the clean up .
Maybe next time the Village can take Pornhub up on its offer :
“Pledging to assist anyone who “wants to get plowed,” the adult entertainment site says it is sending out a fleet of branded trucks to clean the city’s streets and parking lots for free.
“The Pornhub team understands that by this time of year, most cities have run up their budget in snow removal,” Pornhub Vice President Corey Price tells Boston, “and we thought we’d lend a hand in getting our fans plowed.”
The cheeky service, which is only being offered in Boston and New Jersey, is slated to begin when the flakes start falling overnight and continue for the duration of the storm, Price says. Each of the trucks—he says there are more than two dozen of them—will have the porn website’s black, white, and orange logo on their plows and doors.”
Newark, NJ—A short video that explains New Jersey’s “last in, first out” (LIFO) teacher layoff law was released on social media today by Partnership for Educational Justice (PEJ), the nonprofit supporting six Newark parents and their pro bono legal team in a legal challenge to the constitutionality of this statute. In the lawsuit filed on November 1, 2016, the parents assert that New Jersey’s LIFO law violates students’ right to an education by unjustly requiring school districts to ignore teacher quality and retain ineffective teachers while laying off effective teachers, despite substantial research establishing that teacher quality is the most important in-school factor affecting student learning.
The video supports the plaintiff parents in their fight to end an illogical law that puts their children at risk of losing the thorough and efficient education guaranteed to them by the state constitution. By explaining the LIFO policy mandated by this law, the video also informs other New Jersey parents about the negative impact of LIFO and encourages them to follow the progress of the lawsuit. The video appears on PEJ’s website and will also be promoted on PEJ’s social media channels – Youtube and Facebook – as well as select local news platforms. The full script of the video is included at the end of this press release.
State funding for local school districts in the 2017-18 school year remains somewhat uncertain after Governor Christie’s budget address last week. But, in the 2017-18 state aid summary budget released by the State Education Department last Thursday, district allocations are projected to be flat with current funding rates. In Newark, this will result in a $60 million deficit for the public schools. Under the LIFO law, this financial situation forces the district to make a difficult decision: either lay off dozens or hundreds of teachers, many of whom are effective; or, retain ineffective teachers and make cuts to other educational expenditures. Newark Public Schools employ more than half of the state’s ineffective teachers, according to the most recent data released by the state education department. Other school districts around New Jersey are also facing significant funding deficits.
“Most parents I know have no idea about this law and how it hurts our kids,” said Wendy Soto, mother of two Newark Public School students and plaintiff in HG v. Harrington, the parent-led lawsuit challenging the state’s teacher layoff statute. “As a mother, I’m outraged that our children will be forced into classrooms with ineffective teachers while effective teachers are let go. I hope parents pay attention and join the fight to keep our best teachers in schools, especially with budget cuts on the horizon.”
“Especially as districts face significant funding deficits, it’s important that public school parents understand how the current teacher layoff law violates students’ right to a quality education,” said Ralia Polechronis, Executive Director of Partnership for Educational Justice. “Research is clear that teachers are the most critical in-school factor affecting student learning. Because of New Jersey’s LIFO law, districts like Newark, with a significant number of ineffective teachers, are forced to retain these ineffective teachers, and either lay off their more qualified colleagues or cut important educational programming. In the current funding climate, it’s more important than ever that New Jersey’s unconstitutional teacher layoff law is repealed.”
The video released by PEJ today highlights academic research showing that students with high-quality, effective teachers are more likely to graduate from high school, attend college, have higher paying jobs, and higher lifetime earnings than their peers who have ineffective teachers, even for just one year.
Newark ranked in the bottom third of twenty-five urban school districts investigated in a report released last year by the Fordham Institute looking into how difficult it is for ineffective veteran teachers to be removed. Newark Public Schools received only three out of a possible ten points awarded for degree of difficulty removing a veteran teacher who has been identified as ineffective, with ten indicating that it is easy to remove an ineffective teacher and zero indicating that it is very difficult.
To better understand the effect that LIFO layoffs would have on Newark’s overall teacher quality, Newark Public Schools ran the numbers in 2014 on a hypothetical teacher layoff scenario. Under the quality-blind LIFO layoff mandate, 85 percent of the teachers laid off would have been rated effective or highly effective, and only 4 percent of the teachers laid off would have been rated ineffective. Under a performance-based system, only 35 percent of teachers laid off would have been rated effective and no teachers rated highly effective would lose their jobs.
Since at least 2012, the Newark Public School district has avoided laying off effective teachers by paying millions of dollars per year to cover the salaries of ineffective – but more senior – teachers even when no school would agree to their placement in the school. This costly work-around, which cost the district $10 million dollars in 2016-17, has diverted valuable resources from educational programming and other expenses that could improve the education of Newark students.
“Today’s matured residents were yesterday’s school budget voters.
I imagine today’s residents with “Support Ridgewood Teachers’ and “Yes to Full
Day Kindergarten” signs in their yards will be tommorow’s matured residents.”
… Matured resident here, not complaining, just facts. Always voted NO on the school budget, we have the same number kids/schools enrolled in the school system now as we did back then, 1970’s. Voted no on the $1 Million Budget in the 1980’s, ..fast forward, voted no on the $100 Million Budget. There’s no end. Imagine when those downtown apartments get built, how many more school age kids will add to all the systems.
… the support Ridgewood teachers crowd, won’t become the tommorow’s matured residents in Ridgewood – they’ll be long gone once their kids are done with RHS. I know several who’ve done that and many who say this now and in neighboring towns – Glen Rock.
… know many longtime retired residents now that don’t even bother to vote the BOE budgets anymore, say why bother, they get passed anyway. It only benefits the ones who were strongly encouraged to vote for it, with kids in the system. Other towns experiencing the same.
… ask any realtor how many homes in pre-forclosure, auction, foreclosure in Ridgewood, Paramus, Saddle River, in Bergen County. A large number shown on zillow listings, $1m,$2m, $3mill.houses I know a number of seniors who have big reverse mortgages to remain in their homes, even in million dollar Saddle River homes. That revolving door may get stuck when comes time to sell – who will be able to afford to buy into high taxes?
Ridgewood NJ, in a 2017’s Best & Worst States to Raise a Family Wallet hub the Study gave New Jersey high marks rating the Garden state 7th best state in the nation for raising a family.
The survey was predicted on the idea that ,”raising a healthy, stable family sometimes requires moving to a new state. And the reasons are often similar: career transitions, better schools, financial challenges or perhaps a general desire to change settings.
But wants and needs don’t always align in a particular state, which might offer, for instance, a low income-tax rate yet subpar education system. Consequently, a family must make unnecessary sacrifices — the kinds that are easily avoided by knowing which states offer the best combination of qualities that matter most to parents and their kids.
To help with the evaluation process, WalletHub’s data team compared the 50 states and the District of Columbia based on 40 key indicators of family-friendliness. Our data set ranges from “median family salary” to “housing affordability” to “unemployment rate. Read on for the complete ranking, relocation advice from experts and a full description of our methodology.”
The WalletHub analysis used 40 key indicators of family friendliness for its ranking.
The study ranked New Jersey as:
11th best in the country for the percentage of families with kids
9th best for child care costs, adjusted for median family income
4th best for infant mortality rate
10th best for median family salary (adjusted for cost of living)
13th best for violent crime rate
11th best for percentage of families below the poverty level
The Worst and Best States to Be a Homeowner in 2017
February 16,2017
the staff of the Ridgewood
Ridgewoood NJ, for many buying a home is one of the biggest investments of your life, according to Craig Casazza at the consumer site ValuePenguin it’s ideal to buy within a state where housing is relatively affordable and the value of your home is likely to appreciate strongly over time. It’s also desirable to avoid paying more than you can manage in ongoing costs, from taxes to insurance to damage from major storms. Finally, it’s best, of course, if the state where you’re buying boasts low rates of property crime, good schools, and a healthy proportion of homeowners compared with renters.
Casazza rolled together ten key metrics that quantify those factors, and ranked states on how successfully (or not) they offer the optimal factors for home ownership while skirting the attributes you’d want to avoid.
Here is the list of the 10 worst homeowner states and the homeowner scores assigned to them:
The 10 worst states to be a homeowner have some combination of a weak housing market, a heavy burden of costs to maintain a home, and a propensity for calamity and crime. The three worst states are in the south, and specifically from the Gulf region, where yearly storms batter homes and can cause millions of dollars in property damage:
Louisiana 20.97
Mississippi 29.32
Tennessee 29.59
New Mexico 34.69
Alabama 35.04
Missouri 36.64
Texas 39.21
New Jersey 39.54
California 39.97
Georgia 41.53
The 10 best states to own a home generally are less urban overall, with a higher proportion of homes in rural areas, where costs and crime can be lower. Our highest-ranked state for homeownership is Iowa, where it’s very affordable to own a home. With low insurance rates, low mortgage rates, and few calamities that cause insurance claims, South Dakota is another notably inexpensive state in which to own a home.
Iowa 82.60
South Dakota 81.38
Wyoming 79.49
Nebraska 78.17
Maine 77.44
Minnesota 75.37
West Virginia 76.03
Michigan 75.74
New Hampshire 72.28
Wisconsin 71.25
Ridgewood Nj, seems the attempts by the council to reconfigure parking have been met with new calls for “Garagezilla” .
In a recent NJ.com article on struggling downtowns Englewood was mentioned for having over 2000 parking spaces available, including a 345 space garage, many new, upscale downtown housing developments, and still stores are closing. The fact is the retail landscape has changed and it has nothing to do with the lack of parking or limited foot traffic/customer availability.
While in Ridgewood many allies of the former mayor Paul Aronsohn are using any attempt at incrementally adjusting parking allocations to promote a massive parking garage. Aronsohns supporters in the Ridgewood Financial Advisory Committee or FAC continue to use the eerily familiar tactics they used on Mayor Killion and Village Manager Ken Gabbert , blaming all cost increases on the new Village Council.
Remember the Financial Advisory Committee was created by the mayor Aronsohn solely as a breeding ground for future council members willing to live in his shadow. The fact remains that in order for the Financial Advisory Committee to be an effective part of the Village governance the following criteria must be met:
Publish clear and realistic by-laws Post agenda’s of all meetings Post minutes of all meetings promptly All members must sign Financial disclosure forms All members must sign NDA’s or non-disclosure forms
These are professional standards that are used and commonly accepted everywhere in the world. If they are not met in Ridgewood the committee must be closed done otherwise the Village will continue to leave itself open to lawsuits.
There has been a noticeable increase repeat critical comments on the Ridgewood blog mirroring the same lines over and over. The same lines once used against Mayor Killion and Kenn Gabbert are now used against the current mayor and Village council.
“My friend went to park at one of the lots that require an app and was unable to download so couldn’t use the lot. She said the lot was mostly empty and also that there was a fee to use the app. I think the VC made these parking rules so complicated now people are just staying away. I’m not aware that merchants supported this plan. I think the new VC came in with ideas of how to “fix” parking and this is the result. I’m sure merchants would rather have seen a parking garage. Good luck. I stay out of downtown altogether now.”
To bad this poster forgot to mention the “parking app ” was the brainchild of the Aronsohn administration and Former village Manager Roberta Sonenfeld.
“The poster does have a decent point about commuters getting screwed by the vocal, anti-development, municipal-election voting majority in Ridgewood who control the Council agenda. Commuters are too busy to care much despite the fact the Council screws them at every turn, i.e. $250 annual increase to $1000 for a commuter parking space which was moved further away from Ridgewood station after the pass was paid for last Dec. Thanks VoR!”
While complaints about the overpriced commuter parking seem valid blaming the current council for the insane property taxes is a recurrent theme,“So go on blaming Aronsohn for the continued inability of this Council to come up with a viable solution for the commuters who pay the bulk of property taxes in Ridgewood. As 12:43 noted, if Ridgewood is no longer attractive to commuters as a place to raise their families (due to high property taxes versus declining schools despite a $100mn annual BOE budget, etc) then property values fall. As potential revenue sources like Valley leave, those who remain will have to just pay more to cover for the excessively expensive contracts the Village and BOE have agreed to with the public sector unions we contract with. Commuters and taxpayers getting screwed, a declining CBD, and a school system that no longer ranks highly in the nation are all facts”
Again,not sure what the Village Council has to do with the Ridgewood Board of Education, and all the residents voting for constant tax increases ie full day kindergarten and turf fields?
Other comments ecco the same shots taken against Killion ,“What proposals does the new Counxil have James? Rebuild Schedler (no conflicts of interest there, right?). Raise taxes to pay the police even more (again no conflicts, wink, wink)? Are we still studying traffic flow? Where’s the Valley PILOT? What’s the plan to renew the CBD? Commuter parking? How do we replace the potential tax revenues from Valley? Do we need such big, expensive police & fire depts if Valley is leaving in 3 years? Even you know the Village is in decline James, while Summit, Tenafly, Scarsdale and Greenwich all see the increase in their property values outpace ours. Why is that?”
This comment is so full of misinformation it ended up in our spam folder.
It all gets summed over and over by the following comments , The poster does have a decent point about commuters getting screwed by the vocal, anti-development, municipal-election voting majority in Ridgewood who control the Council agenda. Commuters are too busy to care much despite the fact the Council screws them at every turn, i.e. $250 annual increase to $1000 for a commuter parking space which was moved further away from Ridgewood station after the pass was paid for last Dec. Thanks VoR!
Anotherwords if we built the garagezilla and massive high-density housing all problems would be solved …. right that’s the ticket oy vey.
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