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photo by Boyd Loving
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Are you confused about whether to vote NO or yes on the ballot question put up by the “One Village One Vote” gang of five?
Continue reading When the public is allowed to vote, the Ridgewood Board of Education listens
photo by Boyd Loving
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, from the “Keep Our Vote” site ,voting on the school budget vote is an insurance policy against Ridgewood taxpayers being unnecessarily overcharged.
Sadly, the desperate “One Village One Vote” faction has now resorted to defaming residents who disagree with their position by facilitating the spread of blatant lies about dissenters on the heavily censored Ridgewood Moms and Dads Facebook page (a page administered by Ms. Siobhan Crann Winograd, a “One Village One Vote” petitioner).
For the record, I did NOT seek to “overturn” May’s municipal election results as a Mr. Charles Kime suggests in a recent post made on Moms and Dads, and NO e-mail addresses of any Ridgewood voters were included in the response to my OPRA for information about the validity of mailed in ballots associated with that election.
I challenge Mr. Kime to produce any evidence of intent on my part to “overturn” May’s municipal election results, or that I was responsible for supplying the names and e-mail addresses of Ridgewood voters to the “Keep Our Vote” organization.
Lastly, please vote NO on the municipal question via the mail in ballot you recently received.
Thank you.
Boyd A. Loving
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ , the Ridgewood Blog announces its endorsement of President Donald J. Trump for re-election in this year’s Presidential race. The swamp needs a lot more draining . We encourage all of our readers to vote on November 3 and support President Trump and the following choices for Congressional seats:
Continue reading the Ridgewood Blog Endorses President Donald J. Trump for Re-election
Are you registered to vote?
Ridgewood NJ, Tuesday, March 26 is the deadline for registering to vote in the April 16, 2019 school election for the 2019-20 school budget.
PLEASE NOTE: The annual school election on Tuesday, April 16 falls during Spring Recess for the Ridgewood Public Schools. Schools will be closed but polls will be open from 6 a.m.- 8 p.m. Or, VOTE BY MAIL! It’s easy! Just send in the application form to the Bergen County Clerk by Tuesday, April 9.
Links to vote-by-mail applications and voter registration forms in various languages may be found on our voter page on the district website at https://www.ridgewood.k12.nj.us/…/distric…/voter_information.
“I, too, think we should definitely vote NO on the budget. They are just throwing money away. However, in the past we have rarely voted NO and when we did, the Council felt sorry for them and cut out almost nothing. The budget has now reached an unbelievable total so I would hope they can cut more than just “a few thousand”. Cut the frills and leave in anything that is clearly a positive educational function. We don’t need to have every Superintendent’s Aide have an aide and that Aide have yet another Aide. We currently seem to have a system over filled with Administration and not geared to the students at all. You are right when you say the parents don’t dare complain for fear their children will receive some form of retaliation. That is standard to all schools. However, the teachers bear a huge burden in not snapping at the parents who believe that “their child can do no wrong.” My favorite comment came from a kindergartner who refused to follow any rules. He finally got angry and used several rather extreme cuss words. His mother was called and she asked “Well, what did you do to——- to make him angry?” Our daughter -in-law got taken to court by a parent because she had been unable to force a child to take something home which was then thrown out. It suddenly became extremely valuable . Fortunately the Judge literally laughed it out of Court. Teachers are expected to teach an interesting class while ignoring the potential distractions going on. So it is usually our School Board causing problems. “
We all know full day K is extended day-care for moms who work (except in Ridgewood where if fills the need of moms who go to the spa or lunch or tennis). But that is OK, we’ll just pay for it and move on.
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To say that it has and significant educational value and kids who don’t attend full day K will be at a (long term) disadvantage is disingenuous at best.
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The only place where full day K might make sense would be for those children diagnosed with significant (medical) developmental disabilities
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But again, these facts don’t matter – give the moms what they want, pay for it and move on.
Why start applying logic to the Ridgewood school budget now…
vote no
There has to be a point where homeowners taxpayers say enough is enough,12 13000 dollars a year taxes for a postage stamp house in the average ridgewood home district like Somerville or BF DISTRICTS is too much already ..111 per year will be 10000 dollars more in Ten years.
Is not 102 million a year plus taxes for schools and pensions enough..have you no ends to the reaching into my bank accounts ..red flag ..enough is enough,Private options are available for those who look for me and you to pay for
an additional three to four hours of K afternoon class and lunch time,While parents are at yoga or starbucks with errands or at Daddy or Mommy time .
file photo by Boyd Loving, the 3 amigos
I think we need to vote NO, I personally don’t trust what is going on regarding the garage project. I think we need to have the incoming council with the help of our residents and town professionals ie engineer and superintendent take a step back and come up with a plan that is acceptable to our residents. The vote that elected new council members basically was an outcry from our residents that enough is enough and we need a council that works together.
Charlie Nowinski
All information courtesy of The Preserve Graydon Coalition
Events since our June 8 newsletter describing tomorrow’s special election reinforce the importance of voting NO.
The two continuing and three incoming council members do not support the current iteration of the garage, believing that anything built at the corner of Hudson and South Broad Streets should be smaller and not stick out into the street.
The same concern to preserve the Village’s historic character that led the Preserve Graydon Coalition to oppose ill-advised ideas about replacing Graydon with a concrete pool now drives us to join a number of grassroots groups and individuals to oppose the $11.5 million parking garage bond in tomorrow’s binding referendum.
More than a radical alteration in our skyline
Even now, at the 11th hour, many, perhaps even most, residents do not comprehend what’s at stake. And it’s more than a big garage.
Although the official word is that the $11.5 million bond that is the sole item on tomorrow’s ballot would not inevitably fund any particular garage design, it is generally understood that the contract, already prepared and ready to go, would force the new council’s hand, giving them little leeway in determining what, if anything, should be built on the parking lot at Hudson and Broad, and taxpayers would be stuck with the bill.
The garage construction contract that has been readied in hopes of a “yes” vote is said to incorporate a 6% penalty on either side for making changes even though it’s impossible to predict everything that will happen. If the referendum passed and the contract were quickly signed before the outgoing council’s final day, June 30, the new council’s hands would be tied. Apparently that is precisely what the outgoing council members desire, although they deny it. Tomorrow’s special election could have been scheduled for next month, weeks after the new council had taken office—but the “council majority” set it on the first possible day.
Several members of our Village Council have put their concerns in writing. Excerpts, with full text available through the links that follow:
Councilman Mike Sedon:
“I will be voting no in Tuesday’s special election.
In order for the new council to move forward with a comprehensive parking plan for the Central Business District, which includes a reasonable parking structure, it is imperative that we can do so without having our hands tied by the outgoing council majority.
A no vote will not defeat a parking structure. It will allow us, the new council, to incorporate such a structure into the fabric of our CBD along with other solutions that have been mentioned in the past by some of my other colleagues and myself.
A true parking committee should be formed that includes residents, property and business owners along with Village officials to further explore any other ideas that could improve our situation.
The mayor’s previous parking committee did not include residents, and in my opinion resulted in information that appeared filtered and then potentially misrepresented when it reached the wider public.
This outgoing council majority has proven over and over that they cannot be trusted, and I for one will not give them any more trust by supporting what has become a monument to deceit and manipulation.”
https://theridgewoodblog.net/
Councilman-Elect Ramon Hache:
“Ultimately we have a parking distribution problem in our CBD, not a parking deck problem. We have already begun planning for more cost-effective solutions that will require minimal expenditures. . . . The notion that a single parking deck will solve our parking problem is in itself an outdated 90 year old idea.”
Councilman-Elect Jeff Voigt:
Short video: https://youtu.be/hVcW-r8Q-qk
Letter to the Editor, The Ridgewood News, June 10, 2016:
“. . .the Hudson St garage addresses a symptom but not the disease. . . . I am voting no (to not adopt ordinance No. 3521) on June 21st. As a Village, let’s put together something that makes sense, is clear as to what our monies are to be used for, and makes our central business district more user friendly.”
Residents are shocked by the lengths to which Paul Aronsohn and his yes-persons on the Council have gone, along with the Village Manager and others, to make their garage happen.
Dave Slomin, representing Ridgewood Citizens for Reasonable Development (RCRD, formerly Citizens for a Better Ridgewood), notes that the garage would set new guidelines for size and scale that developers would use to obtain permission to construct bigger and more dense buildings here. High-density developers could seek garage-related “parking variances,” giving them the opportunity to build as big as they wanted under new high-density ordinances passed by the outgoing mayor’s voting bloc.
The group recommends voting no in the referendum for reasons outlined here:
https://theridgewoodblog.net/
RCRD supporter Jim McCarthy shares his views in this short video: https://youtu.be/3MSgIMYcfyA
A new lawsuit and a new ethics complaint
A lawsuit has been filed in Superior Court claiming misuse of Village funds and employees’ time to create a video posted on the village website that urges residents to vote for the referendum:
https://theridgewoodblog.net/
In addition, a complaint has been filed with the Local Finance Board in Hackensack—the agency that enforces the Local Government Ethics Law—by the Open Government Advocacy Project of the New Jersey Libertarian Party. The letter names Mayor Paul Aronsohn and Village Manager Roberta Sonenfeld as having violated “N.J.S.A. 40A:9-22.5(c), which prohibits a local government officer from ‘using’ or attempting to use his official position to secure unwarranted privileges or advantages for himself or others.”
The video was watched several times by Rev. Msgr. Ronald J. Rozniak (Father Ron), Pastor of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church, who wrote in his weekly bulletin yesterday (pages 2-3) that it “lists a number of entities that were consulted. You will not hear the name of Our Lady of Mount Carmel mentioned . . . . Incredibly, the single largest reality, neighbor, directly across the street from the deck, not four or six blocks away was ignored. This is despite the fact that Mount Carmel hired its own traffic consultant from an equally reputable traffic consulting firm.”
If reducing Hudson St. to two lanes would “eliminate the on-street parking on the church side of Hudson,” he wrote, it would “unquestionably have a negative impact on the operations of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.”
https://www.olmcridgewood.com/
More quarters in the meter for longer hours
To repay the bond—a loan, after all, not a gift—we would face extended street parking meter hours and fees, including at the Route 17 Park & Ride, rising incrementally over time. This would add insult to injury for taxpaying residents while driving shoppers and diners to the many surrounding towns that provide parking for free. Only a few years ago, when meter hours were extended to 8 pm, downtown business owners objected to the council and the end time for feeding meters reverted to 6 pm. Why would 9 pm fare better than 8 pm did?
For these reasons, we consider it essential to reject the proposed bond and to vote NO onTuesday, June 21.
If tomorrow’s referendum passes, the three outgoing council members, while stating repeatedly that the new council will be in control, are prepared to rush-approve a contract for an enormous garage via a special council meeting a week before leaving office. That would leave the new council in a “bind.”
Bonding…binding…bind.
Only by voting down the referendum can residents prevent GarageZilla from rising above all it surveys at the corner of Hudson and Broad.
Where to vote: wherever you usually do. Polls will be open from 6 am to 8 pm.
To share this message (please do), click on “Forward this message to a friend” below the pail photo below.
Swimmingly,
Marcia Ringel and Alan Seiden
Co-Chairs, The Preserve Graydon Coalition, Inc., a nonprofit corporation
Ridgewood NJ, This is the Hudson Street lot at 9:20 Friday morning. I do not know how many Village Council meetings I have attended at which members of the Chamber of Commerce stated that this lot is filled to capacity first thing in the morning every morning with commuters and restaurant workers. My crummy little camera does not show the scope of how empty the lot was. Please vote NO on June 21. We might (operative word is “might”) need a small increase in parking, but we certainly do not need the gigantic garage that Aronsohn, Roberta, Hauck and Pucciarelli are continuing to promote in the waning days of their time in “power.”
June 6,2016
Text copied from post by “Take Back Ridgewood”Facebook page :
The referendum petition which over 1200 Ridgewood residents signed and submitted under Home Rule to the village clerk, called for a referendum question in November election with the following text:
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“Shall Ordinance No. 3521 authorizing the Council of the Village of Ridgewood to issue $11,500,000 bonds or notes to finance the cost of constructing the Hudson Street Parking Deck, currently contemplated as a 4 story, 5 level Parking Deck, be ratified?”
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Our Mayor and current council majority are forcing this election before they leave, and they changed the referendum question to:
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“Shall ordinance No. 3521 submitted by referendum petition providing for the Council of the Village of the Ridgewood to issue $11,500,000 bonds or notes to finance the cost of constructing the Hudson Street parking deck, be adopted”
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Summary: Over 1200 Ridgewood residents submitted a petition, asking for a question in November election for 11.5M bond for a 5 level garage. The Mayor and his team fast tracked that election and removed the text about 5th level from the question.
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1.Mayor Aronsohn is trying to ignore May 10th election and people’s will. If this question is voted “yes” on June 21, he will award a 5 level garage contract in his last 9 days. NO BIDDING has been done for this 11.5 Million$ contract and the details are only known to Gwenn / Paul / Roberta / Albert (I.e. Parking committee). The new council elects and Susan and Mike will have to work with this new contractor for project completion, while they are NOT being part of the contractor selection process or any other design / engineering discussions. Mayor Aronshon and his team will not be here to see through this project to it’s completion – and won’t have any accountability. Why are they hiding the contractor selection process from other council members?
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2. Mayor Aronshon is again pulling the “it’s only financing question” card, which he did in November election. He is writing to residents saying “Basically, do you support financing and building a parking deck at Hudson Street that could cost up to $11.5 million.”. He is hiding the fact that this special election was called for because of the size and design of the garage. The residents united to stop the financing because of the size of the garage.
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Please vote ‘NO’ on June 21st, and let the new council pick a contractor for Hudson Street Garage after July 1st. So they can see through the project to it’s completion and can be held accountable for picking the right contractor.
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Reader says Vote NO on the big garage, Hudson lot half empty at 3:45 pm Saturday, 6/4
Ridgewood Nj , So the big vote is tomorrow and where as cynics would suggest residents will have the option to once again agree or disagree with a proposed project that will be jammed down their throats whether they like it or not . Not buying it ,take one look at Schedler Field ah Park or what every you call it .