May 10,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, in case you have been out of the country ,Village Council Election day ,the polls are open from 6 A.M. to 8 P.M.
This is a pivotal for the future of the Village of Ridgewood .
Weitz Willet and Brooks signed the Paul Vaggianos development pledge , which is a continuation of current movement to turn Ridgewood into Union city . And signifies they will be working for special interests instead of the residents of Ridgewood .
Weitz has never voted , or been to a council meeting because he is “busy”.
Willets husband moved to Florida with out her.
Weitz Willet and Brooks are backed by the current council majority (3 amigos), developers and Progress Ridgewood the pro development group ie double the size of Valley hospital ,build ,build ,build .
CRR, CBR and Preserve Graydon groups as well at the Ridgewood Chinese American Association all endorsed Voigt ,Hache,and Walsh .
Most importantly Walsh, Voigt and Hache all understand the unique nature of what Ridgewood is all about unlike the current council majority ,who think Ridgewood is a small Union city waiting to happen. https://theridgewoodblog.net/the-ridgewood-blog-endorses-jeff-voigt-bernie-walsh-and-ramon-hache-for-village-of-ridgewood-council/
Don’t get fooled again. Remember just vote yes for parking really meant a huge garage. Vote lines 1,4,& 6.
I’ll take lower taxes, Roberta and somewhere to park. 3,2,5 exacta for me please.
lol the garage will never pay for it self , and the development will cost massive amounts of money for infrastructure Wietz, willett and brooks will do nothing but raise taxes while turning Ridgewood into Union city without the good Cuban food
Brain – Roberta, Willet and Weitz are actually INCREASING the taxes this year. The hearings are not scheduled until tomorrow.
Back of the envelope costs of promises made by 1,4,6 at the debate and in their mailers:
–$500k-$1m legal fees for prolonged 2 front litigation against Developers and Valley
–$3m to cleanup Town Garage site and build parking
–$1m to restore Schedler house, clean up trees and produce a totally passive park that no one outside of that neighborhood will use
–$1m(??) New fields promised by Voigt and Hache–typically fields are paid for by RSBA not the village but in their mailers they seem to want the village to pay for them
–$2m lost revenue from downtown businesses because of no parking. This is an estimate based on current rate of about 8% of municipal tax revenue comes from CBD. Figure that goes down to 6% as businesses fail and the property is worth less.
So we have a total of $8 million in new spending right there from 1,4,5
2,3,5 have not proposed any new spending. The developers will pay for the infrastructure improvements as required under the site plans. PLUS ONLY WEITZ has proposed having Valley pay into a PILOT program. That means more revenue and lower taxes.
I’ll take the lower taxes and go get a Cuban sandwich…thanks.
you forgot a couple of things most CBD businesses will not survive the construction phase , * million in new spending is going to cut taxes how??? , developers want taxpayers to pay for all infrastructure thats why they are backing the 3 amigos replacements
Good luck to Jeffrey, Bernie and Ramon. Good riddance to the outgoing council members.
Time to a sweep out the henhouse…bulldozer voting block to the rescue.
Setting the table for a real representative government.Only one way to go now..And that’s up to an improved and representative council.Get out and Vote.
I pray that today people will come out and vote. Not 20% like during last elections because it will cement the power of crooks and the quick demise of Ridgewood as we know it. If that happens time to run away and let Valley and developers rein as they wish.
11:47 the last village council election with 20% turn-out I voted in elected Mike and Susan — not sure they are part of the reign (“rein” lol! surprised is wasn’t “rain”) cementing the power of crooks or not. since low turn-out favors the motivated you have a better chance seeing single issue candidates elected with 10% turn-out than with 30% turn-out. but, whatever. war is peace, ignorance is strength, freedom is slavery.
Hey Brian – How about we just kill the garage altogether and take the money we save to fight the criminals like Valley and the developers? I think the residents have had enough of being bullied and threatened by special interest groups and the politicos that they have in their pocket. You know who to vote for people – enough is enough with this crap.
2.11 is right.Garazilla was a complete boondoggle from day one.Lots of wasted loot flying around on plans ,drawings ,architects ,soil & site surveys ,,Change orders…etc.. none of it being thrown around at all by the merchants…
Brian- this: “The developers will pay for the infrastructure improvements as required under the site plans.” is not true. They are not bound to do so at 100%, “site plans” don’t mean anything and that’s “not a thing” and you know that. There has been the same amount of parking in Ridgewood forever, and the demand for parking is so low, the village has admitted on the record, it doesn’t need to rent an open lot behind the movie theatre. Plus all the candidate up for election today are for the garage being built. So about your lower taxes argument, which we would all love, where have the the Three Re-Amigos said they will cut spending? The Three Re-Amigos all love the 4x higher fees to pay for the garage, so it cannot be there, they love HDH, so it can’t come from the new school costs as enrollment rises. Is it a magic money tree they are planting? Just where on their web site is the words lower taxes? I did a search, here’s the result: Your search – taxes site:ridgewood2020.com – did not match any documents.