Tenafly voters reject proposal to move, expand nature center
NOVEMBER 4, 2014, 10:20 PM LAST UPDATED: TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2014, 11:17 PM
BY DEENA YELLIN
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
TENAFLY — Borough voters on Tuesday decisively rejected a bitterly debated proposal to relocate and expand the Tenafly Nature Center on another part of its unbroken woodlands.
The referendum verdict of 2,107 to 1,536 was non-binding for borough officials poised to make final decisions about the proposal. But all sides in the two-year debate over the plan have already agreed to abide by voters’ wishes.
“I’m disappointed,” admitted Mayor Peter Rustin when he declared that opponents had prevailed.
Both the mayor and Mike Neus, chairman of the Tenafly Nature Center’s capital campaign, indicated in recent weeks that if the proposal is rejected, the issue of a new building would be dead. Opponents had contended that the existing building — considered by everyone now as substandard for the growing crowd of visitors that come for environment education — could be expanded somewhat. But Nature Center managers have said that would require an enormous amount of site work including rock blasting.
Roland Scharfspitz, a member of the Save the Tenafly Green Acres residents’ group that fought against the proposal, said, “We fought the good fight, and the town saw the right way. We saved a precious resource for the town.”
https://www.northjersey.com/news/tenafly-voters-reject-proposal-to-move-expand-nature-center-1.1126437
