photos courtesy of Boyd Loving’s Facebook page
June 1,2017
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Ridgewood PD Patrol Officer Stephen Cummings came to the aid of a fawn whose leg had become stuck in steel drainage grate in front of 200 Elmsley Court, Ridgewood on Wednesday evening, 05/31. After freeing the fawn’s leg, Officer Cummings remained on the scene to await the arrival of a representative from Tyco Animal Control Services.
Photo courtesy of Boyd Loving’s Facebook
June 1,2017
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Ridgewood Fire Department personnel came to the aid of a bird trapped in a storm drain on Veterans Memorial Field, 131 North Maple Avenue, Ridgewood on Wednesday evening, 05/31. The apparently uninjured bird flew away immediately after members of Ridgewood FD Engine Company 35/37 pried the storm drain’s grate up. The distress call to Ridgewood FD HQ had been placed by the parent of a child who was watching a nearby Little League baseball game and heard the bird peeping for help.
file photo by Boyd Loving
By Jeff Deminski May 19, 2017 12:38 PM
Yesterday, a bill made it out of an Assembly committee which could be a cash cow for a lot of towns. Part of a package of bills called “Antwan’s Law,” it would allow towns to establish permanent lower speed limits near schools. Right now you have school zones during certain times when schools are in session. Another part of this package triples the fine you pay. Interesting.
“Antwan’s Law” is named for Antwan Timbers Jr., a 17-year-old high school student who was struck and killed while walking on Route 130 in Burlington City last year. Sounds like the law makes sense, right? A student walking home at the end of his school day gets hit because some jerk is speeding, and it shouldn’t be allowed.
What if I told you Antwan was tragically killed at around midnight, not when school let out, and by a drunk driver? The school was closed. Empty. An equally tragic story, yes. But he wasn’t walking home from school. He was walking with a friend near a Wawa that happened to be near the school.
Read More: Meet New Jersey’s new speed traps | https://nj1015.com/meet-jerseys-new-speed-traps/?trackback=tsmclip
courtesy of Boyd Loving’s Facebook page
March 11,2017
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Members of Ridgewood FD Engine Company #35 assisted a Cedar Avenue, Ridgewood resident whose dog accidentally became locked inside of a 4-door Buick sedan on Friday morning, 03/10. The vehicle was undamaged during the rescue process and the dog was happy to see the waiting firefighters.
courtesy of Boyd Loving’s Facebook
December 26,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, A rollover crash on Lincoln Avenue near Godwin Avenue in Ridgewood on Saturday afternoon, 12/24, resulted in personnel from Ridgewood PD, FD, and EMS being dispatched to the crash location. The adult male driver of a Ford Explorer was trapped in his vehicle until he was freed by Ridgewood FD personnel, and then transported by a Ridgewood EMS ambulance to a hospital for treatment of a hand injury. The flipped vehicle was removed from the scene by a flatbed tow truck. Glen Rock PD units provided traffic control during the incident. The driver apparently lost control of his vehicle, which mounted a curb, and then rolled over after hitting a utility pole guy wire.
A review of Village Council Resolutions and related contract documents expose the plan
June 17,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, Mayor Paul Aronsohn and Village Manager Roberta Sonnenfeld may be so desperate for a yes vote because, despite their promises to turn all design decisions over to the incoming Council, they have figured out a way to control those decisions from beyond their political graves. Most upsetting is that this comes on the heels of a carefully choreographed set of theatrical performances at the last Village Council meeting designed to give the impression that the outgoing Council was going to take a hands off approach. Of course, the very next morning the Mayor launched his illegal media blitz, which has already drawn an official ethics complaint and a lawsuit. Hardly an act of graceful stewardship on his way out. More like giving the new Council the back of his hand for delivering an election thrashing to his hand picked slate of successors.
The Council has hired an Agent, Barr & Barr, in a no-bid process as their representative to solicit bids from construction firms to build the garage. Further, they recently spent $ 20,000 more dollars asking for a Guaranteed Maximum Price contract, which not only is not the norm in NJ municipal construction (by the Village Engineer’s own admission), by its very definition it is only possible when the construction documents are at least 70% complete. So clearly in the minds of the lame duck Council Majority they are committing additional money to make sure Design D is built.
Finally, in the Mayor’s illegal propaganda video, created at taxpayer expense, Tim Tracy of the garage design contractor, Desman, indicates there is a 12% contingency fee to account for design changes. A cozy interesting side note is that Barr and Barr was referred in by Desman and the Village Manager indicated at a Council meeting that the Village did not even interview any construction firms that were not referred to them by Desman.
That’s right, we turned our largest construction sourcing decision in years over to an outside contractor in a no-bid process based only on the Village Manager’s undocumented opinion and her cozy relationship with Desman. The same Village Manager who has expended over $500,000 creating multiple sets of construction plans before a design is even finalized. The first set was commissioned even before an initial design was vetted with the Public. One of the plums falling from the taxpayer tree was a $295,000 contract with Desman that ballooned again when virtually every one who saw Garage Design A threw up on the idea as a grotesque monstrosity jutting 12 feet out into the street. To this day the Council Majority says that if it was up them they would have built Design A. I know the local architect had an unreasonable client, but he couldn’t have been happy designing what essentially looked like an upscale jail right in the middle of the CBD.
The net of all of this arrogance and gross mismanagement is that the new council may wake up theoretically owning the design decisions, but finding out the Mayor left them a contract that is booby-trapped with excessive design changes or cancellation penalties.
The ONLY way to derail this plan is to VOTE NO.
photo by Boyd Loving
BY KATHLEEN LYNN AND DAVID SHEINGOLD
STAFF WRITERS |
THE RECORD
In the overheated housing market of 2005, Barbara O’Leary and Dennis Poletto bought a Bergenfield colonial for $440,000 — just five years after the previous owner had paid $175,000.
Now, they’d like to downsize into a place with no stairs. But they feel they can’t move, because real estate agents have told them their home would probably sell for about $330,000.
https://www.northjersey.com/news/north-jersey-home-values-trapped-in-a-time-warp-1.1610704
By Jim VandeHei
Apr. 19, 20162:00 PM PDT
Here is how they fell into this lethal trap: They got into the content game to produce news or info they might be proud of, believing they could lure us to read it and maybe even pay for it. They quickly realized it’s expensive to produce quality content and hard to get a lot of people to click on it, much less pay for it. So they deluded themselves that the better play was to go for the biggest audience possible, using stupid web tricks to draw them in. These include misleading but clicky headlines, feel-good lists, sexy photos and exploding watermelons.
And it appeared to work. Traffic spiked. Costs were contained. But revenue never followed because everyone else was doing the same tricks and getting the same spikes—and the simple law of supply and demand drove down the value of their inventory. This dynamic helps explain why Mashable recently laid off so many journalists, BuzzFeed saw its growth miss the mark and many media companies and investors are freaked out.
Here’s the good news: This era is getting flushed away. Some companies feel self-conscious about the trash they are producing. Many others realize it’s simply not a good business model. But the savviest ones see a very cool reason to change: A content revolution is picking up speed, promising a profitable future for companies that can lock down loyal audiences, especially those built around higher-quality content.
https://www.theinformation.com/escaping-the-digital-media-crap-trap
Ridgewood Firefighters Free Elderly Driver Trapped after Accident
March 2,2016
Ridgewood NJ, The elderly female driver of a Chevrolet Impala involved in a two (2) vehicle crash at the intersection of Lincoln Avenue and Bellair Road in Ridgewood on Tuesday, 03/01, at approximately 4:15 PM, was trapped in her vehicle until freed by Ridgewood firefighters using forcible entry tools.
The victim requires the services of a walker and was unable to be removed from the vehicle via the passenger side door. She was transported to The Valley Hospital by a Ridgewood EMS ambulance with what appeared to have been non life threatening injuries. The other driver also sustained a minor injury in the crash, but did not appear to have been transported by ambulance for treatment. Both vehicles were removed from the scene by a flatbed tow truck. Ridgewood PD is investigating the incident.
BY MATTHEW MCGRATH
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
HILLSDALE — Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays postal couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds. Now you can add wild turkeys to the list.
A foul-tempered flock of wild turkeys, also known as a rafter, accosted a postal worker Tuesday on Esplanade Drive.
The uninjured mailman sought refuge in his truck while the postmaster called police around 12:10 p.m., Detective William Diedtrich said.
Confrontations between turkeys and people are rare, but in populated areas, where they are not hunted or trapped, the birds have little fear of people.
“We don’t stand our ground and act like predators,” said Paul Curtis, a wildlife-human conflict expert at Cornell University in New York. “They don’t have any negative consequences so, they won’t fly or run off. They don’t see people as a threat.”
Katy Barnato | @KatyBarnato
The global economy seems trapped in a “death spiral” that could lead to further weakness in oil prices, recession and a serious equity bear market, Citi strategists have warned.
Some analysts — including those at Citi — have turned bearish on the world economy this year, following an equity rout in January and weaker economic data out of China and the U.S.
“The world appears to be trapped in a circular reference death spiral,” Citi strategists led by Jonathan Stubbs said in a report on Thursday.
“Stronger U.S. dollar, weaker oil/commodity prices, weaker world trade/petrodollar liquidity, weaker EM (and global growth)… and repeat. Ad infinitum, this would lead to Oilmageddon, a ‘significant and synchronized’ global recession and a proper modern-day equity bear market.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2016/02/05/citi-world-economy-trapped-in-death-spiral.html
The specter of a destabilizing run on debt is haunting markets
By
JOHN CARNEY
Updated Dec. 13, 2015 3:22 p.m. ET
The debt world is haunted by a specter—of a destabilizing run on markets
Last week, this took on more form even if there weren’t concrete signs of panic. Only one mutual fund manager, Third Avenue Management, has said it would halt redemptions to forestall having to dispose of assets in a fire sale. The rest of the industry has been quick to say that while redemptions are elevated, particularly in high-yield bond funds, there doesn’t seem to be a rush to for the exits.
Still, growing angst comes as the oil-price rout continues and the U.S. Federal Reserve appears ready to raise rates. This has investors worried—and starting to ask the fearful question: “Who’s next?”
Goldman Sachs, for one, put out a note Friday warning Franklin Resources “is most at risk” given the large high-yield holdings of its funds, poor performance and large outflows. On Friday, its shares fell sharply. Meanwhile, there were unusually large declines Friday in the value of exchange-traded funds that track high-yield debt.
The idea of a “run” on mutual funds might sound strange. Typically, runs are associated with highly leveraged banks engaged in maturity transformation, funding long-term loans with short-term debt. Nearly all the programs designed to avoid destabilizing runs—from deposit insurance to the Fed’s discount window to liquidity requirements—are built for banks.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-liquidity-trap-thats-spooking-bond-funds-1450028193
file photo by Boyd Loving
I recently noticed that Ridgewood police have used to their advantage new pine trees that have been planted in front of the Bergen County utility shed on Franklin Turnpike behind a park-and-ride lot. This provides perfect cover for their vehicles to monitor speeding cars heading north on Franklin Turnpike.
Prior to the tree planting, police would monitor from this location but be visible. Certainly their visibility deterred or reduced the likelihood of speeders. Now their camouflage doesn’t deter, but it facilitates the choice to speed and for Ridgewood to issue summonses and garner revenue.
So is the Ridgewood Police Department in the business of deterring vehicular violations and related accident risks, or only issuing summonses? How would police feel if I was able to get permission from one of the property owners to post a sign on Franklin Turnpike stating, “Speed trap ahead hiding behind the trees — slow down.”
It seems to me this would be a win/win for all drivers, reducing the likelihood of speeding and preventing accidents. But revenues may be reduced.
Gene Ret
Ridgewood, Nov. 23
By AIMEE PICCHI MONEYWATCH September 1, 2015, 5:15 AM
By one dismal measure, America is joining the likes of Third World countries.
The number of U.S. residents who are struggling to survive on just $2 a day has more than doubled since 1996, placing 1.5 million households and 3 million children in this desperate economic situation. That’s according to “$2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America,” a book from publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt that will be released on Sept. 1.
The measure of poverty isn’t arbitrary — it’s the threshold the World Bank uses to measure global poverty in the developed world. While it may be the norm to see families in developing countries such as Bangladesh and Ethiopia struggle to survive on such meager income, the growing ranks of America’s ultrapoor may be shocking, given that the U.S. is considered one of the most developed capitalist countries in the world.
“Most of us would say we would have trouble understanding how families in the county as rich as ours could live on so little,” said author Kathryn Edin, who spoke on a conference call to discuss the book, which she wrote with Luke Shaefer. Edin is the Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University. “These families, contrary to what many would expect, are workers, and their slide into poverty is a failure of the labor market and our safety net, as well as their own personal circumstances.”
To be sure, the labor market has been rocky for many Americans, not just the poorest. But changes in how employers deal with their low-wage workers have hit many of these poor Americans especially hard, such as the rise of on-call scheduling, which leaves some parents scrambling for hours and dealing with unpredictable pay.
Retailers such as Walmart (WMT) and fast-food companies increasingly are using sophisticated scheduling software that allows them to tinker with work schedules at the last minute, depending on their stores’ needs. That reduces costs for the employer, but it can make life difficult for employees, especially those with children and dependents.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-surging-ranks-of-americas-ultrapoor/
By Drew Harwell and Simon Denyer August 25 at 4:48 PM
U.S. stocks plunged in the last hour of trading Tuesday to wipe out a day-long rally, adding fresh uncertainty to markets that had seemed to be on the rebound.
The wild swing highlighted investors’ anxieties over an expansive Chinese slowdown and hinted at fault lines in an American economy otherwise seen as strong.
The surprise setback dropped the Dow Jones industrial average more than 650 points from its mid-day peak, its biggest reversal since 2008, and pushed the index of 30 blue-chip stocks down 204 points, or about 1 percent, to 15,666.44.
Investors had spent most of the day climbing back from a dismal Monday and from several days of carnage in Chinese stock markets. China’s central bank on Tuesday cut interest rates in a bid to stimulate the country’s economy, and for a while that appeared to reassure European and U.S. markets.
But by late afternoon, Wall Street went back into selling mode, as lingering fears about a slowdown in the global economy undercut the brief surge of confidence.
