photos courtesy of Ridgewood Professional Firefighters FMBA Local 47
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, at Wednesday nights Village Council meeting , the Village council honored four Ridgewood Firefighter EMT’s . On January 23rd , Richard Brooks the Ridgewood Parks, Recreation & Conservation Board Chairman suffered a massive heart attack ,in which according to Mayor Paul Vagianos his heart stopped beating for 35 minutes .
Mayor Paul Vagianos stated that Richard Brooks and his wife were his personal best friends for over 35 years.
Ridgewood FireFighter EMT’s Lt. Jordan Zales, Chris Mead, Matt Musicant, and Matt Bombace were honored by the Village Council for their quick and decisive exceptional CPR rescue that dayl .
The council also swore in Ridgewood Firefighter Greg Corcoran on his promotion to lieutenant.
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A public expression of thanks and official recognition was definitely in order for all of those who assisted in keeping Mr. Brooks alive, especially those citizens who were unexpectedly thrust into performing CPR without any forewarning.
This touching news story is sadly tainted by the fact that Mr. Brooks and his spouse, Ms. Gail Price, Esq., owe the Village of RIdgewood over $50,000 in back taxes and penalties.
Notwithstanding this sizable financial obligation to the Village, Mr. Brooks was recently reappointed by Village Council members to the Ridgewood Parks, Recreation & Conservation Board, on which he currently serves as Board Chairman.
Rich should step down from the PRC Board until his debt to the town has been cleared.
Why sad? If he’d died then then he really wouldn’t be in a position to pay those precious taxes.
Leave it to the Anonymous haters to turn a life saving story sour .
Save it for another day .
Shame on you 👎
Get real. The ceremony could have been held without all of the accolades to the deadbeat couple offered up by mayor Paul.
What makes them special, because they are best friends for 35 years with Mayor Vagianos. That is ridiculous. No one is saying that saving a life is an astounding feat and not everyone would be so lucky, but to flaunt and parade around town when Lord knows what is going on behind the scenes and apparently this woman will do anything for money at this point. Lots of folks struggle, but she seems to always be on the wrong end of things and who knows how they got into a financial mess to have to borrow and still owe in the first place. It is none of my business, but this woman seems to have a dark cloud of shady sh*t following her because she is behind the billboard application which is bad for Ridgewood and she introduced her friend, the mayor, to the shady historic consultant who was later hired amidst controversy for the Schedler property development. What does that tell you?
Agree with the first commenter. Glad he’s ok. Grateful to the people who saved his life. But this does not absolve him of responsibility. Pay your debts man. There are a lot of people in this town with way less than you and your wife but they pay their way.
Didn’t Vagianos give him a sizable chunk to get him out of debt?
Yes. $47k in March of last year.
Stacey Antine, Richard Brooks and Gail Price all standing within inches of Pee Wee. He must’ve wet his pants. Becky was the only favorite missing.
I think he has got access to a new Becky these days!
I don’t belive that anyone isn’t appreciative of first responders and a life saving attempts for anyone. Municipal leaders are responsible as elected officials to see the big picture and to prioritize the necessary funding according to what is important for everyone in the community. Therefore, based on favoritism, cronyism and nepotism, many people are upset when monies are lent which may give the impression of conflicts of interest. The mayor lent them a large sum of money and because people see that the mayor is prioritizing special interests like the Central business district and fields for sports and not much else. His lending of monies to Brooks, currently chairing several committees and his wife Price, a former planning board attorney for Ridgewood and named lawfirm partner representing the company planning to erect a giant digital billboard in Ridgewood, it is hard to not feel that there are many conflicts of interest and ethics violations. Does the mayor leverage influence with the Zoning Board officials who are set to vote on this? Does the mayor stand to benefit financially from advertising his businesses to drive traffic to the CBD. If not an ethics violation outright, at least soome really poor lapses in judgement that look really bad. Add Healthbarn into the mix and many speculate favortism is in high gear from the mayor as he participated in the $4 million feed the frontlines and Healthbarn has a very low cost lease and supposedly running their operations 24/7 according to Habernickel neighbors. This is why people get upset.
The Village Council appoints this man to represent the taxpayers. And yet he himself does not pay taxes. This is wrong. Plain and simple
Well, if the taxpayers did as he, maybe the taxpayers would start getting some of the things they’re constantly complaining about?
Glad he’s Ok and thank you to those involved in saving his life. Let’s not keep turning goods news into bad.
No one is taking away his good news. Glad he is ok. Truly
Now he needs to step up and pay his bills. We all pay our taxes and guess what many of us have various health and personal crises too.
I never let something as mundane as a personal crisis get in the way of what’s important: stiffing the government and making fools of taxpayers.