Update – “No deal” yet with Midland Park to use Central Dispatch
September 18,2014
Boyd A. Loving
8:48 AM
Ridgewood NJ, Ridgewood Village Manager Roberta Sonenfeld announced publicly on Wednesday, 09/17 that no official deal had yet been reached regarding the provision of 911 call answering and radio dispatch services to the Borough of Midland Park by Northwest Bergen Central Dispatch (NWBCD). NWBCD is jointly owed by the Borough of Glen Rock and the Village of Ridgewood.
It is rumored that neither Sonenfeld nor Lenora Benjamin, Glen Rock’s Borough Administrator, were kept completely “in the loop” regarding discussions with Midland Park. Pricing, staffing levels, and the possibility of radio frequency congestion are rumored to be open issues.
Governing bodies of both Glen Rock and Ridgewood are now reviewing the proposal and will have their respective municipal attorneys draft a contract for review and signature by Midland Park officials once all open issues have been satisfactorily resolved.
Heard from the boys downtown that this was all arranged without telling Chief Ward or Chief Van Goor anything. They both found out about it by reading it on The Ridgewood Blog.
The village manager seemed pretty ticked off last night, calm but steaming about this. Understandably.
Be wary when you have to search for details on your own.
So how is our Village Manager going to handle this? What would she do in the corporate world when the boss get blindside. Or some try to make a deal without authorization.
Well let see. She didn’t know anything about underpass project and she did know anything about NWBCD and Midland Park deal. Sense a pattern here.
Maybe this is a good time too for someone to investigate how why and who provided employees of Hawthorne with radio communications equipment wired to Ridgewood’s Office of Emergency Management radio channel or authorized use of the channel by those employees with their own radios to conduct routine Hawthorne business. Central’s manager lives in Hawthorne and is on Hawthorne FD I hear.
Yet another clear example of director Tancos making lofty promises with little or no ability to deliver the goods. The majority of his staff are mediocre on a good day, and as soon as the call volume picks up, the level of service goes downhill fast. The Village Manager needs to investigate this situation vigorously and see why there was such a concerted effort to push this through before any scrutiny by those tasked with oversight.
He is simply trying to save his job. If Glen Rock and Ridgewood decide to close shop, as did Tri Boro, he will be out of work.
Agreed #7, the NWBCD is a den of iniquity…. just like Ridgewood Water, it’s a black hole, tax payer fraud on the taxpayers of Ridgewood. The VM should go after NWBCD and Ridgewood Water, both. Time to get rid of all mob influence in Ridgewood and clean up the PD while we’re at it.