Garwood's INDEPENDENT T.R.E.E (The Roaming Eye & Ear)

Post #37 The uncalled for attacks on the mayor from the dais 12/15/11

2011-12-15T15:38:00.004-05:00

12/15/11:
From this past council meeting, speaking for myself, I have to comment further than what was posted on the GW forum.

What galls me, as a resident and taxpayer, this year 2011 is the attacks on the mayor, who so far has not even served one year yet, from those sitting on the governing body. The public, i would say is allowed to do it, since they are the taxpayers and if they are dissatisfied with an issue they should have a need to express their sentiments to the mayor and governing body. Of course you all know that I use that latitude freely the other years and even in this year.

But for members of the governing body to use that action is just plain wrong. There must be decorum and a dignified effort at procedure the governing body holds among themselves, and when addressing each other up at the dais. I am not condemning the whole governeing body, but 2 members.

This year i have seen 2 uncalled for public attacks, both against the mayor.

One I had afterward expressed my concern to the councilor by phone, but it fell on deaf ear. That was the one where in an September council meeting councilwoman Todisco read publicly a letter from the recreation committee chair accusing the mayor of politics in the appointment process of members of the rec committee; which really makes that claim odd since the mayor appointed Todisco herself this year to the rec comm and Todisco is of the opposing political party than the mayor's. She should have recognized that the letter just was not right. That letter should never have seen light of day. The letter, even if there was any iota of validity to it, should have been tossed and a council report reworded by Todisco in a more dignified manner. The councilor should have handled herself a lot better than she did. And after the true explanation came out, weeks after, that proved her wrong; she then only summed it all up as just "miscommunication". She never apologized publicly or privately. We could chalk her actions up to either political arrogance or political innocence. She hasn’t been around long enough to be arrogant; she is nescient at this game. Maybe she has been indoctrinated with political fear of the opposing party. Good spinmeisters can catch a lot of gullible people in their webs; the county being a good example of this.

The latest one was at the 12/13/11 Tuesday council meeting. This was during the issue of the abolition of the longevity for the non-bargaining boro workers. To us it looked like it may have been choreographed, but it can’t be; so it was probably a combination of coincidences and telegraphing? During the speaking portion, the ex-mayors wife asked what the mayor’s sentiments were on the abolition of longevity, even though the mayor only would preside and would not vote on it, except in a tie. She unabashedly stated if voted for abolition, she would not sign the bill, forcing it tot a quick death. That certainly was a courageous statement since she said it before the governing body even voted. That could have given some sway the councilors vote either way. (Which actually after the vote, which was 4 for and 2 against, it appeared to luckily have no affect. All votes were correct and without prejudice IMHO). Right after the mayor made her veto type statement, councilor Matthieu quickly pulled out an email from June 2nd that was sent by the mayor to an unnamed recipient, and pointed out that in the body of the email, the mayor stated that longevity would best to be gotten rid of. To have this email at hand meant that there was going to be a premeditated move by the councilor for some reason; that possibly the mayor had expressed her sentiment in the weeks leading up to this December meeting that she was considering not to sign it if passed. In councilman’s Matthieu’s preplanned attack on the mayor, he did precede it with the statement that her veto meant that she was “hanging the committee out to dry”. He obviously was insulted since his committee did a lot of work on addressing boro workers contracts and took heat for it over the months. But we did not see the full context of the email he read. The mayor in her response to his reading the email noted that during those times, she was involved in minor guidance of how to address boro expenses and was not making any demanding statements but was leaving it up to the committee back then. (This last sentence is in my own words as I did not write the exact language down. Obviously the minutes of this December meeting were taken. But even though he may have been disconcerted, councilman Mattieu should have never taken up a full attack from the dais to try to embarrass the mayor. That was plain wrong. Should another apology be expected? We have come to understand to not hold our breath on anything in GW. But he will probably read this, and he would come to terms as to whether apologize or not, privately or publicly. The interesting item here is that he is of the same political party as the mayor, so we must wonder just what is his big picture agenda here. He seems to be alienating himself from being a good legislator.

The mayor during these attacks remained unflustered and held her dignity in explaining the situation and we give her full credit.

Resident Sytko in his impassioned goodbye early in the council mtg hit the nail on the head, that something is not right anymore in Garwood and this could be the path of the destruction of GW. Does it stem from the swing of power between the political parties? No it’s been going on for a while and ever increasing (and this governmental “anti-cooperation” is even apparent up to the federal level.) Besides the Garwood residents got fed up with the previous powers and their shenanigans and slowly disposed of them over the last few years. Maybe in observance of just this year, some of it may be initiated by the opposing party exiled and is created by their frustrations of the lost of control after 20 years, but it is more than that.

And the residents and taxpayers seem like innocent bystanders with no control in this ongoing horrible drama.

Post #36 News from the Occupy Wall Street front reaches Garwood.

2011-11-06T17:32:00.004-05:00

As I was leaving Kings Supermarket, near the exit there's was some newsletters from Occupy Wall Street. Only 3 or 4 copies though.

Its a third edition, and I didnt see the first 2 editions there before. 4 large pages, photos and articles expressing their purpose and how the organization evolved and is evolving.

That brought flashbacks of the late 60's early 70's era where the people's activism was in full stride regarding the war, environment and equality. Activism gives the people a voice and possibly brings change to the landscape just like back then.

Attending Rutgers Engineering school and very busy I wasnt integral then, but i did understand the underpinnings. On my way between classes, I stood listening to those who were stanidng on top of the phone booth speaking to the gathered crowd of students. (does anyone remember phone booths anymore?) I had taken something very important away from that bygone era and its ingrained. The message to me was people can change a bad system with perserverance and getting out any necessary information to promote the needed change.

There is frustration on all levels and those levels want to be heard toward participation in a better world. One such level calls themselves the 99% and publish the newsletter i reference above..

To me, this is what its all about. Whatever level of success that may be attained is always a step forward. We should all wish them luck. Its a long time coming for a second revival. The winter is setting in so unknown if they will have legs through it. I hope to see further editions show up at Kings Supermarket helping in the spreading of information for this cause.

Post #35 Those political emails from last year

2011-10-07T21:25:00.003-04:00

Its campaign season 2011 again. This TREE blog has now decided at this time to reveal those incendiary emails from 2010 that cropped up right before election time. In reading these first 2 emails, one can feel how partisanship, when blind, can readily enable and condone a bad political spiral that Garwood was going in. One can only suppose nastiness and name calling behind the scenes may be their normal modus operandi and that is very juvenile. But if anything they were probably just typed up on the spur of the moment, since this 2010 was a major election for the democrats to hopefully hold onto the waning powerbase. There was also an unfounded charge in the third email, that was subsequently forced to be cleared up that evening. This whole fast episode was all very embarassing. After election the charged atmosphere immediately calmed down.

The email list that was used was large and within 12 hours there was heavy backlash from the recipients against the negative emails. And of course you know from the 2010 election results the residents and voters reacted accordingly.

Any names have been "ex'd" out. Those involved in the town probably can figure them out, but cest la vie. This is to finally chronicle what I had alluded to in my post #19 Election Wrap up since many people were very interested in what exactly went down with these "day before election" emails.

1st Email mid-day November 1st, 2010

Subject: Reminder!
Hi! Couple of things...

1) If you are at all interested in continuing the bulk pick up program, please return the form that was in the "Just The Facts" newsletter from Borough Hall. By returning the form, you are under no obligation to participate.

2) Elections will be held tomorrow. Please turn out and vote! While I am voting democratic and while the air of "change" is in the air, I am asking you to consider not voting for XXX XXXXXXX. This is not the change we in Garwood need! I was at a recent council meeting and I have never seen anyone so rude or disrespectful in my life! Well, except for XXXXX XXXXXXXX of course!

And speaking of XXXXX, if he or others of his cohorts are spreading rumors about XXXXXX XXXXXXXX, please go see XXXXXX and/or XXX XXXXX to get the truth. Its one thing to spread lies about the town, but it's another to spread lies about specific people! Get the truth from reliable sources! It's the only believable source!

Enjoy your day! (Sorry if you get this more than once!)

XXXXX XXXXXXX

2nd Email in support of 1st Email late afternoon November 1st, 2010
XXXXX,

I agree with you 100%, I have seen what this town has been through with all the negative XXXXX puts out about our town, and I disagree with all his negative propaganda. He is a very rude individual and disrespectful to people who volunteer in our town. XXXXX has one goal and that is to destroy how far this town has come over the years.

I have known XXXXXX and XXXXX for so many years and I can say they are keeping our taxes at a minimal, even though the school taxes keep rising. Don't let creeps like XXXXX and XXX XXXXXXX destroy this town including XXX XXXXXXXXXX. I have not seen XXX in years, why doesn't she come out of the closet and show people who they are voting for...She's been hiding for years from the citizens of this town, trying to get in as XXXXX. WHO IS SHE????????? Someone who is out there for political reasons NOT GARWOOD....Lets show these creeps like XXXXX and XXX XXXXXXX what Garwood can accomplish.........

Love this town..... Please take five minutes out of your time tomorrow and vote....

Vote for XXXXXX, XXXXX and, XXXXXXX XXXXXX

Thank you
XXXXXX XXXXXXXXX

3rd Email rebutting the 2 others early evening November 1st, 2010

Certain individuals can call XXXXX any names they like, but keep in mind what XXXXX has said through the years has yet to be refuted or disproved. To repeat: his uncovering of what has happened to GW has not been discredited. Read the flyers. This is a fact. After all, he is the only one that attends all local and county government meetings. He is informed. Ask yourself who are you getting your info from? Is it objective? Call any council member and ask them if that police cover-up happened? They did not know this until 5 months later.

If you notice the email sent to you by XXXXXX only says one direction, vote democratic so all we see he is a democrat operative, and you can easily tell this by what has been given him in town. He may have worked hard for some but he also received special dispensation when he needed it. XXXXXX has a financial interest so of course he wants to fight against those that will stop this largess and special interests for him and his ilk. Ask yourself, how did XXXXXX get that email list that you are on? More than likely he has abused a boro email list for political purposes. This should be investigated. Things like this must stop. You received an email from XXXXX saying XXX was rude, but I was at the council meeting too and she was rude and out of order attacking a resident. She condones her own actions but condemns others. We all have opinions but must express it in the appropriate way.

This election cycle has stretched our emotions, you can see that. All people being attacked by all sides do get involved in town and do volunteer selflessly. We don't know who to believe and where to turn. Pay attention to any information, weigh it as to whether it is correct, discredited or not. That is all any candidate could ask when you are deciding on your vote.

XXXXX as an activist has fought specifically for our town and no other agenda. There should be no conflicts of interest when serving the residents. Therefore, only certain officials or candidates are in his sights not all of them. XXXXX has told people to vote democrat or republican. Party makes no difference, it is whether the candidates are specifically for the interests of all the residents and do not harbor thoughts in the back of their mind as to what they are getting out of this system they want to continue.

Vote your conscience, be informed, consider both the democrat and republican candidates not just line and bullet vote. This is what got NJ on all levels in big financial trouble; the media says that about NJ time and again. The winds of change are needed for us all, not just those "connected", but for us all. Our governor Chris Christie has stated that he can't do it alone, that we as citizens of NJ must help him

Thank you for your time, and please vote November 2nd, 2010 for the candidate of YOUR choice.

This is an email- Paid for by XXX XXXX-XXXXXXX XXXXXXXX

Post #34 Ten years later Garwood Remembers Sept 11th, 2001

2011-09-14T18:23:00.004-04:00

Dana Evelina made this tribute to the Twin Towers. It reads: To all the lives that were lost. Forever in our hearts. Signed, Dana

Rank and File in Uniform: The First Aid Squad, the Police, The Fire Dept

Tom Spera, the serving fire chief back in 2001, gave a short speech about Garwood and how the GW FF served as back up to a fire house in Brooklyn while those firefighters were at ground zero putting out fires

The cub scouts turned out in uniform and stood with the rank and file of our first responders.
Here they salute the color guard as it passes by them.

There were about 80 residents in attendance and 60 first responders in uniform. Program started at 6pm, lasted for 1/2 hour.

Post #33 Some Irene pics

2011-08-29T00:14:00.012-04:00

The mall was completely empty. Power was out for about a week.

Some stores taped their windows in preparation to Irene's winds, but the winds lessened.

Tree down on West street between Spruce and Locust.

Tree down on Oak St between North and 2nd. It took out main power lines and North avenue was closed for day and a half. This is councilman Hak explaining the situation.

Next day was sunday. Mass at St Anns was canceled. North side has no electricity for days.

Portable generators were used everywhere. Merchants along North and South avenues were without power for up to a week.

Underpass, that was under construction and not yet paved, was under 8-10 feet of water. Power to the pumps went out. No damage to the new construction. 8" rain fell during saturday night.

Couldnt get by on center street. Lincoln avenue and Central underpass was flooded. The way to get to the other side was either the westfield circle or thru the center of town in Cranford.

Post #32 Dumb, Dumber, Dumbest

2011-08-28T23:13:00.004-04:00

Dumb, dumber, dumbest 8/28/11

Normally, the TREE for the last 8 years chronicled Garwood doings, but I have to share the complete nuttiness that transpired by my own doings. We all commit mistakes of some minor importance or another, yet with no impact, but these 3 events took place over the timeframe of 1 week 8/18 to 8/27, and left me scratching my head, or whatever melon is up there on top of my shoulders. And the odd thing is as time went by, it just kept getting worse. There comes an inflection point where you recognize that you’re not Joe Cool anymore, just some guy wading through middle age. This may be the point.

Dumb: Friday August 18- On AOL, in the email management section, one can save their own emails either on the main AOL server, or on their own PC. In 2007 I decided to start saving all my emails into my own PC. I left my old emails still on the AOL server. Well, on Friday I decided to transfer my various folders, which were still full of single emails, from the AOL server to my own PC. I won’t go into the process, but there’s a lot of clicks involved. The first folder transferred perfectly and then I subsequently deleted it from the AOL server. It was a minor folder, had a couple of emails in it. I then attended to the second folder which was a large folder with about 200 emails, all fairly important, but for some reason it did not actually transfer. But I thought it did and so I proceeded to delete it from AOL's server. After the deletion, I noticed it wasn’t on my PC. I searched around then panicked and contacted AOL via live help. That was in the span of 20 minutes. Unfortunately, for a half hour she tried a lot of different things but could not recover anything. We ended the help dialogue with the fact that once its off the AOL server, there is no back up even for a minute. Learned? --That I should transfer everything first and then delete it all at the very end instead of one at a time. Keep that in mind those who still are using AOL. Dumb.

Dumber: Monday, August 22nd- The county govt. and its utilities authority is refinancing 1 of 3 major bonds for the incinerator in Rahway. Via OPRA from the county I received amortization tables in an unsearchabble PDF format, so I opened up an excel sheet to plug in the numbers with the other 2 Authority bonds to weigh the validity of the refi. I had to hand type in all 3 bonds into the XL. After I was done typing and analyzed the numbers, I was concerned that the bond was similar to a ballon mortgage with huge back end payments. So I right clicked the xl tab and renamed it and saved it on my desktop. I then emailed it to the county freeholders with questions on the validity of the refinancing. I then received an email from one freeholder pointing out I also had sensitive info in the same XL I emailed. When I looked at what I saved, sure enough, along with the tab on the bond refi, were other tabs containing my Christmas list, phone numbers and even my insurance, EZpass and bank account policy numbers. Here’s what happened: I used an existing personal XL booklet on my desktop, and just opened a new XL sht tab for the refi. Pretty lazy. I then thought if I just right click on one of the tabs I could save it as a separate XL book. But all I did was save the existing book with all its tabs under the new name: county bond refi. At the next freeholder meeting at the mike I apologized for putting the freeholders in the uneasy position of receiving my personal info. Learned?—that I should open a fresh XL every time or at least don’t commingle info that shouldn’t be commingled. Dumber. Then I remarked to my wife that I thought my idiocy was done.

Dumbest: Friday/Saturday August 27th- This one takes the cake. With hurricane Irene bearing down on us, I have a brook in the back yard. My sump pump which the previous owner put in the basement was just a big hole punched through the basement floor slab, and a square VCT piece placed in the hole to hold the sump pump. Between the floor opening and the VCT wall, is an interstitial opening and there occasionally has been water coming up through it onto my floor. With the hurricane I knew the water would definitely appear and also may worsen if the power is lost. So I bought some concrete mix to fill the interstice. I started to remove the sump pump so I could work around it. First I bumped the float to make sure the pump worked. It worked. I proceeded to mix the concrete in portions, and at the same time working to lift up everything on the basement floor up to a higher level just in case the power is lost to the pump. I finished both arduous jobs, and went upstairs. My wife asked me if I tested the pump when I was done. I told her I couldn’t because if I put water in the sump it may wash away the fresh concrete but not to worry I checked it before I started the project. As we all know hurricane Irene hit during the night. The next morning when I woke I looked in the basement and there was 2 feet of water. I was shocked, and assumed the power was lost. That was when my neighbor said the south side never lost power. I waded into the water to the sump pump in the corner and looked at it. In plugging the pump cord back in, there was also an extension cord plug hanging down near the same electric outlet. It was that one I grabbed and plugged into the outlet instead of the sump pump cord plug! @!!!!@#!! I switched plugs and the sump pump got rid of the water in 2 hours. So I probably could have avoided the whole watery mess I now face this week. Learned?- Listen to my wife and occasionally check things during any prolonged crisis. Dumbest!

Well, I ran out of superlatives so I hope I ran out of dumb things to do in the future. (but I doubt it.)

Post #31 another long council mtg of 8/9/11

2011-08-16T17:12:00.006-04:00

The 8/9/11 council mtg—This was 2 hr 39 minutes in duration, but I am not going to blog on the full details like the complex June 14th mtg which actually lasted 6 minutes less at 2 hr and 33 minutes. I’ll highlight, but the reason I am blogging is that this meeting was not full of many intricate issues but was basically full of IMHO unnecessarily lengthy discussions on just a few issues. This blog is more just to make a point to a councilman, who I was having a dialogue with on the Garwood forum. The point is that there may be too much belaboring of issues without any true change to results, that time may be wasted for no real reason and this gives an appearance of obstruction to the public. This chronicle is simply my opinion of the events as I observed and wrote down at that time. To those who attended if any corrections are needed, please contact me promptly for attention.

The mtg portions were broken down into: from 7pm to 7:20pm- This was for the police promotions and hiring. 7:25 to 8:24- This was the workshop session. From 8:36 to 9:39pm- This was the council meeting proper. Councilman Sluka and our boro eng’r Don G were absent/excused. Boro attny Triarsi had sent a substitute in his place.

The first 20 minutes were the police promotions and hiring. There were about 70 people in attendance, many of them the relatives of the applicable officers. Some promotions listed in the consent agenda weren’t physically done formally in the council chambers that night. Suffice it to say, we have 2 new officers, and the new command structure of captains, lieutenants, and sergeants are in place. After the relatives left, there were about 15 people remained in the audience.

The workshop session issues were the upcoming underpass construction, purple heart monument, where should the seniors go for AC cooling if heat wave, and the bulk pick-up. The bulk issue took up the brunt of the time. Councilors JM, ST and LP asked the questions on bulk for further details. LP’s was just a minor question but the other 2 councilors, ST and JM asked the bulk of the questions. (no pun intended.) ST apologized for her ignorance of procedure and hoped her questions were not out of order. Both had issues with the transparency of information that they were not aware of the details enough to vote on the ordinance 11-13 which was later listed on the proper mtg agenda. However, in the course of the questions back and forth between ST/JM and the mayor/boro admin/councilor TH (Streets & Roads committee chair), councilor VD stated that indeed the details are being hashed out in the meeting, so no further time is needed. (Clarification per the mayor 8/18/11:) Councilor JM expressed such sentiment of major obstacles to the ordinance such as not enough detail, cost, not enough time for understanding the issue, possible wear and tear on the truck and workers comp/injury liability for the DPW workers, overtime, that the mayor interrupted and asked JM if he would like to table the ordinance and send it back to committee. This phrase is removed: Councilor JM wanted the bulk ordinance tabled . This nearly brought the bulk issue to a standstill, but due to time constraints the boro admin said the intro of the ordinance had to be voted on in the meeting since it would be instituted in September and had to be final voted and further coordinated with the residents. The mayor and the boro administrator tried to placate JM’s concerns, that the boro will use the older trash truck and the DPW is well aware of the potential injuries and there will be no OT; and in the end the vote to accept the committee recommendation to leave the bulk pick up program as recommended was unanimous. Just prior to the vote JM noted on record that he was still concerned with truck wear and tear and worker injury. One detail that did change, based on a member of the publics concerns-the bulk application due date of august 15th was too soon. The aplication due date was changed to friday august 19th, giving the public 4 more days. Workshop was over at 8:24pm and a short break ensued prior to the mtg proper.

In the formal council meeting, the bulk pick up ordinance was on for first introduction, there were no more comments by governing body and it was voted to introduce unanimously. The balance of the committee reports were normal, public comment was minor. The next lengthy portion of the meeting arose during the consent agenda near the end. JM wanted two reso’s removed and voted on separately regarding #11-241 for hiring a part time seasonal help and reso #11-245 for implementation of ordinance 10-10. The latter one was interesting in that it was referenced by a past number 10-10 and not the specific topic, so the public was unaware exactly what was on the agenda, until this portion of discussion came up. The reason why it was worded such is that the whole salary ordinance had to be “reintroduced” by “title,” even thought it was the shade tree salary that was set aside for later discussion (which was now).

For 11-241-(seasonal help): JM wanted this tabled since he did not know the costs, and he asked the boro admin, but she did not know the exact costs either. However, it was pointed out that these moneis are already in the budget and JM is the finance committee chair in control of the budget. It was also noted to JM that the seasonal position in the budget has a cost for hiring 1 full time seasonal person, but the position was subsequently split into 2 half positions so the cost remains the same. Again, VD, a finance committee member with JM said it was in the budget. JM said he did not like the way this reso came up. JM's motion to table however was not seconded. The vote was put to the floor and JM was the only one who voted “No”.

For 11-245-(shade tree position): JM wanted to table this one also. JM had wanted the mayor to put together a written job description ahead of time so he knew what to vote on, but the mayor previously had pointed out to him the job description is in the standard “Codes of the Boro of Garwood”, so it was unnecessary and redundant to write up a job description. Also JM pointed out that this specific reso back up was missing from his council info packet. However, a few others volunteered they did receive their back up. Boro admin noted that she would look into it as to why JM’s package was deficient. JM wanted it tabled so the DPW may take over the duties and hopefully save the $4500 stipend allotted for the duty, but VD said that the DPW wants no part of this work. ST noted to JM he should have brought this all up a lot earlier, not suddenly now. She also felt comfortable enough to vote on it. The mayor said if the job description is insufficient she will send it to Laws & Licenses Committee for review and a more detailed job description if required. JMs motion to table was not seconded. A vote was put to the floor and JM was the only one who voted “No”.

Meeting went to end, gaveled and adjourned at 9:39pm.

Post #30 A most interesting 6/14/11 council meeting

2011-06-28T18:15:00.007-04:00

This is a compilation of the June 14th, 2011 workshop and council meeting; maybe a little dry but contains the info of what transpired, hopefully in proper order. Detail may be lacking since I took notes while people spoke. If anyone has an addition or clarification, please notify me for correction. The boro admin also has her transcript on the boro website.

The TREE felt it appropriate to chronicle these 2 sequential meetings since they had many interesting facets and issues for the public. First this was held on Flag Day, and we certainly saw democracy in action.

The workshop normally prior to the council meeting started at 7PM. From the very start, both the workshop and council meetings had the residents very involved. There were 35 people in attendance and 2 stringers. The workshop meeting actually went to 8:56pm, nearly 2 hours; and since as far back as I was attending, this was a record duration. At workshop start, Don Guerriello, the boro engineer gave his report regarding the construction bids for the latest DOT project for our local roads; that the plans are still down in Trenton waiting to be signed by the proper parties. Mr. Triarsi the boro attorney discussed the 6 zoning ordinances being presented at next meeting; the Pointe's contentious issue regarding snow plowing (the Pointe association must do it); and the process of health cost deductions from the boro employees. Councilors Todisco and Sluka questioned the boro attorney regarding personnel policies, raises, yearly reviews and the procedures involved.

At 7:15pm, the meeting then continued into the report by Steve Greet, our Garwood RVSA representative. (Rahway Valley Sewerage Authority). He reported that the RVSA is restructuring from 60 employees to 55 employees, there is a new executive director at a reduced salary, labor negotiations are ongoing. He also noted many issues of litigation. One was the adjunct cogen facility which is now shut down indefinitely. The facility cost about $20 mill to build and is useless. RVSA is suing the designer, construction manager, contractors for this for a total of $36 million. (This is a travesty in itself and could be a separate blog. Suffice to say, Senator Lesniak had his greasy fingers all over this boondoggle, from the initiation of the expansion project right down to the filing of the suit against the same parties that he, as a political boss, in behind the scenes control of the RVSA pushed them onto the RVSA expansion project.) Also, I&I (inflow and infiltration) is a serious problem and each municipality needs to address this at the residential level. A resident asked about the Pay to Put $2 mill loss to PSE&G for not using gas service adn which the RVSA has to pay; and the Clark/Gypsum Plant lawsuit which Clark lost.

At 7:30pm there was a handout to the public and presentation on the latest plans for the recreation complex. This portion lasted until 8:17pm. Most of the residents were there for this issue. Mr Musial, the architect gave the presentation, explaining the construction alternates for the building, decking and field. The plans will be sent to Trenton/Green Acres for the next step in the approval process, and the plans will go out to bid soon. This will take 30-60 days. The existing kitchen appliances are to be removed and reused, although some are borrowed and leased. The building and deck is raised 2 feet above the flood plain. Many questions from the audience arose regarding: parking spots, building orientation, the storage building, lighting, the original dedication plaques, security, bleachers, second scoreboard (none), kitchen equipment, physical plant, a necessary hose-bib for the field sprinkler system, and is there a separate area for picnics and Frisbee throwing (not really). 2 interesting issues that were broached was: who owns the existing building. If it is the baseball league, then there is a serious problem that may halt construction since proper authorization hasn’t been retrieved. Also a question of maintenance of the entire complex and the cost arose. The president of the baseball league said that the league is presently taking care of the existing facilities and so will then take care of the entire complex. However, he qualified it that the same crew may not be around in 5 years. As to cost, this was downplayed in that already there is gas and electricity being paid for; and there will be no maintenacne labor costs since the league will take care of everything. A resident brought up that the Cranford residents on Rankin avenue across from the complex should be notified prior to construction, but this suggestion was dismissed by the governing body for no reason given.

In a continuation of the workshop meeting the mayor opened up discussion to the governing body for general issues. Further discussion was: an Open Public records seminar will be given to those involved in boro public service. There will be a “Purple Heart monument” donated by that organization to be erected in the boro. Location unknown at this time. This will be handled by the VFW and the KOC. Also Cnclor Sluka said a PBA plaque will be given to PO Wright at the little league field.

One issue in particular which raised eyebrows in the public was when Councilor Matthieu wanted to speak about the Police Chief search. This quickly turned into a grave issue taking on an “inquisition” type Q&A with Councilor JM asking questions to Mayor PQ and Councilor T Hak, both who were on the police chief search committee. JM’s questions were as follows: he asked if they had read or were aware of “statute title 40” right in the beginning of the search process; also wanted to know if the committee went outside of the department during the search; what is the governing body going to do about the media already reporting previously that the new chief was “selected”. JM had problems with this word. He wanted the mayor to send a retraction to the paper since the new Chief wasn’t “selected”. He found fault with the departmental structure once a lieutenant is promoted to chief and there is then a gap in command that is missing a captain and a lieutenant. JM stated that this is then in violation of our own ordinances. In a quick response to JM’s last allegation, boro attorney Triarsi said, “Just because a councilman says something is in violation, doesn’t make it so.” JM also wanted to know when he can see Underhill’s resume and wants to discuss this before any voting takes place.

Mayor PQ and TH responded in proper fashion to each of JM’s queries. I will not specify who did each response but together as follows: The committee became aware of the statutes during the search process. There are 300 sub sections and the committee was reading each for applicability when JM first referenced to the committee the one about internal commands and promotions. They were not aware of this one right in the beginning of the search. The initial plan was to promote from within to maintain the decorum of the department. As to the medias’ misstatement about "selection", the mayor was not going to do a retraction, that JM had already sent a letter into the paper with a correction. The word “selection” is inappropriate, and that the search committee only “recommended” Lt. Underhill for chief. It needs to go to vote of the governing body. This will be done in the June 28th council mtg and the swearing in will be July 1st. (JM responded to this that he is put in an awkward position whether to vote "no" since he had questions about the integrity of the process.) As to the gap in the command structure, there is always time and latitude for promotional issues, they don’t always have to be done all at once. First the chief and then the other promotions will happen. Underhill’s resume will be distributed prior to the vote at end of June's meeting. This then ended the Q&A on the police chief search.

The meeting was opened to the public at 8:50pm to which Ms. R Snow stood up and said that there were 2 incidents of harassment while she walked on Willow and on East. She said it consisted of a councilman and “you know who you are!” She stated that she went to Lt. Underhill and he said it will be resolved. Workshop was over at 8:55pm.

The council meeting started at 9:05pm after a 10 minute break. This portion went quick with the usual committee reports held to a minimum. The “hearing of the citizens” portion had commentary on the upcoming 10 year memorial event for 9/11 in September. This will be handled by the boro's celebrations committee. A resident asked if shared services will involve police dispatch being turned over to the county. Councilors JM and KS responded that they had attended a “shared service” symposium held between the county and it's towns the other month and they filled out a line on a piece of paper that was handed out at that symposium that asked what our town may consider. They noted that “dispatch” was something they jotted down, but they did not follow up on it. There are 8 other towns now seriously considering dispatch to be handled by the county, Garwood not one of the 8. At the closing of the comment period, a Ms. McCarrick stood up and chastised councilor JM, that he spoke out of order in his arguing with the Mayor and TH, and was not in the dignity of a council position. Mayor PQ then closed the public hearing portion.

For the final meeting's disposition, on the consent agenda is listed resolution 11-203 authorizing the boro administrator to advertise in the newspapers for bidders for the Athletic Field Complex project. it was voted for by unanimous vote.

The meeting was then adjourned by mayor PQ at 9:33pm. A rare length of 2 1/2 hours.

Post #29 2011 Muni Budget Q&A 5/2/11

2011-05-02T09:09:00.004-04:00

FYUI- Here are a few Q&A's on the muni budget I thought would be informative to the readers who may be inquisitive of the muni finances. It is in a format where the questions were asked and then the answers from Ms. Bruns the boro CFO are right afterward in italics. I thank Ms Bruns for her thoroughness.

To the boro administrator, mayor and governing body: I thank you for the opportunity in allowing members of the public to comment and ask questions on the Garwood municipal budget. It is also commendable in again reaching out and having the public email any budget questions ahead of time to allow the financial officer to review and be able to have any appropriate information ready at the meeting. I apologize for it being so close to the budget vote at the council mtg but hopefully this does not create too much duress. This is also based on the budget I received on 3/7/11 at the workshop.

General Budget Questions:
1) What happened to the cap bank reso that normally appears the council mtg before the budget is voted on. Answered at mtg by Auditors. This year it had become unnecessary when the 2% mandated cap criteria came into existence.
2) How many boro workers accepted the $6,000 stipend to opt out of the boro insurance plan. This appropriation would be located in what account code. No one took the stipend in 2011. If they had it would appear as a separate line item in the budget document called “Health Benefit Waiver” following the Health Insurance line item. The FCOA code would be 23-221.
3) How many members are presently in the PERS pension system? How many are in the PFRS. There are presently 41 PERS members and 17 PFRS members.
4) Have we budgeted for the approximately $54,000 loss in the lawsuit over the Police Officer Mirabella incident. No, it is not in present budget.
5) In the budget are there any costs that are recoded and now are in other line items different from last years line items? (the county does this under the guise of “reorganizing” every year. The BOE did it some shuffling the other year.) What are they. All costs are reflected in the appropriate line items and there have been no changes or recoding.
6) How many total condominium units of the MEWS aka The Pointe are now on the tax records for this budget year. 44 out of 44 units now on tax rolls.
7) How many units of housing have filed for a tax appeal last year. Also so far for this year. How many appeals have been adjudicated in 2010. How much in tax moneys had to be remitted last year. I see sht 20 accnt 36-477-2 has $10k allotted for appeals pending. There were 25 county appeals in 2010 resulting in an adjustment of $30,867 to 4Qtr taxes. There are currently 24 county appeals for 2011 which are still pending. There are 5 state tax court appeals pending.
8) How many of the mayor and council are taking the health insurance. How much is this costing the taxpayers for the part time positions? One council member is covered by the Borough’s health insurance plan at an annual cost of $20,476 for medical and $733 for dental. (editors note: this year based on the mandated 1 1/2% health care cost pay-in, this person will pay 1 ½% of the council stipend of $1,500- or only $225 for this.)
9) What is our total debt including bonds. What is the increase from last year. Our total net debt at 12/31/10 was $3,772,877 which is down $2497 from the prior year end. At 12/31/10 our debt was broken down as follows: Bonds $570,000 BAN’s $2,166,197 and debt authorized but not issued $1,036,680. (editor's note-these numbers include the rec complex borrowing.)
10) How many Garwood residences are in foreclosure? We have received notice of 21 foreclosures since 2009.
11) How much $ did the library give back to the boro from last years appropriation if they did not use it all up. The library has not turned over any unused appropriations to the boro.
12) 3 officers (2 PO and the Chief) are retiring this year. Do we have the going away costs (unused sick/vacation/other) budgeted in this budget. Yes we have part of the $ in this year’s budget and some in reserve.
13) If we institute the 1 ½% giveback on the health costs from the employees, how much is this generating back to the budget. Effective April 1st all employees no longer aligned with a union began paying the 1.5% healthcare contribution. This will generate approximately $6386 in 2011.
14) There may be offline budget items that hold taxpayer monies in cash management accounts and is nowhere to be found on the budget. How many accounts are there and how much $ is in them. Discussed prior to mtg.
15) Any cost for bulk pick up appropriated? No, none in this years budget.

Revenue questions:
1) Sht 4 accnt 08-103 Alcoholic beverages: This shows and increase of almost $5,000. Were the fees raised by ordinance last year? Yes Ordinance #10-04 increased these fees.
2) Sht 9 accnt 10-713 Kids Recreational Trust fund grant: This decreased by $60,000. This money is generated by the county golf fees and the county has proclaimed that they made record fees in golf last year. Why did it decrease? Per Boro administrator: Kids Recreational Trust fund comes from the Open Space tax. In order for municipalities to obtain and utilize this tax for open space projects they have to apply in accordance with the grant application prepared by the Open Space Trust Fund. The borough has and will continue to apply for these funds.
3) Sht 11 accnt 10-001 Total section F public/private revenues: This went from $132.5k to $62.8k a decrease of ($60k). Why. This total reflects the $60K reduction mentioned above.
4) Sht 11 accnt 15-499 Receipts from delinquent taxes: With the economy getting worse why would you expect $200,000 in revenue. Per state budget law we are permitted to anticipate a percentage of delinquent taxes as revenue. That amount for 2011 is $273,450. We actually anticipated a more conservative amount of $200,00.

Appropriations questions:
1) In the appropriations section on the far right side of the page is a “reserved column”. Please explain what happens to these monies. The reserved column is a snapshot at 12/31/10. If we receive bills in 2011 for charges incurred in 2010 we charge the appropriate 2010 line items. At the end of 2011 any balance remaining in 2010 appropriations is turned over to surplus.
2) Sht 15 accnt 25-240-1 Police Wages: Since 2 PO and 11 chief are retiring and there were rookies on the payroll last year, why is this account still increasing by 8.2% from $1.667m charges in 2010 to $1.804 for 2011. Per sheet 15 the 2011 Police Salary line item is $1,785,823 an increase of $17,648 or 1% over 2010.
3) Sht 15a accnt 32-465-2 Sanitation landfill other expenses: If we paid $135.8k in 2010 why are we increasing it 13% to $153k. The paid or charged amount of $135K was as of 12/31/10. The actual amount paid for 2010 was $147,411. This line item was decreased from 2010 by $30,500.
4) Sht 20 accnt 36-477-2 LOSAP costs: how did you arrive at $25,000. Normally this runs around $40-50k. The finance committee reduced this appropriation. The annual costs range from $36K to $43K.
5) Sht 27 accnt 45-925-2 Payment of BANs: This went up almost $35k. Why. BAN’s require a minimum paydown after the third renewal. We had 3 ordinances which were borrowed against in 2008 that required this paydown for the first time in 2011.
6) Sht 27 accnt 45-935-2 Interest on notes: This went down($23k). Why. The interest rate for BAN’s maturing in 2010 was 2.75% The interest rate for BAN’s maturing in 2011 was 1.5%. Our current BAN rate is 2.0% so this appropriation will be higher next year.

Thank you Ms Bruns and Ms Arriemma for your time and attention.

Bruce Paterson 4/25/11

Post #28 A true democratic party is evolving in the county 3/21/11

2011-03-22T13:58:00.004-04:00

http://democratsforchange.net/2010/05/get-local/

As you should be now fully aware, the county connected democrats which call themselves “regular democrats” on the election party line actually hijacked the democrat party line for their own self-serving agenda. You have heard the facts time and again about nepotism, bad politics, pension padding, cronyism, behind the scenes manipulation, uncalled for give-aways, rampant waste and spending, mostly on the county level and other towns but yes some of it appears in this town also. You have read my past flyers. (if you haven't read the flyers contact me for a copy)

A while ago, I had suggested that the true democrats get rid of those self serving democrats in control on the local and county level. By the election results, you have indeed been trying and even had some local successes.

You now have the chance to formally clean up the government of bad politics by a true democratic party. See link above. They are called "democrats for change."

This is a new democratic party line to challenge the “regular democrats". The organization has been around for about two years. Some of their candidates were on on the primary ballot last year. They are fed up with what is going on inside their party but have a tough time getting high profile and fostering enough forces to change it, since the county “regular democrats” control the nominees, candidates, selections of the party.

I may be an independent, but I do recognize that this is a good choice we have if we want to see good government revived. You know I endorse by voting for libertarians, independents, democrats if they show they care, republicans if they show they care. But if indeed you think that we are a democrat town and county then these are the true democrats to help us. These "democrats for change" are to replace the "regular democrats". There is a struggle betwen these 2 and you may hear "regular democrats" bashing the new-comers. But just look them in the eye and say, anything is better then the proven self serving corrupted system you no have in place. That is the truth; they should be ashamed of themselves for what they created and enabled.

The "democrats for change" are comprised of factions from Elizabeth, Rahway, Plainfield, Hillside, Roselle, Union. You’ve heard me call these groups the Fajardo democrats, Devine democrats, Mapp democrats, Menza democrats.

In talking the past few years to this group they are looking for candidates in Garwood, the county and other towns to run in the primary challenging the “regular democrat” line. It is time for change within the ranks. Those in the know of politics, know exactly what I am talking about regarding control and not being able to ask questions. You have become disenfranchised. Click on the link.

You can either contact them or even talk to me about working towards a solution. I may not be of a huge help here since I am an independent, but I know them and work with them and want to help our boro. Obviously so do you, since the last few years you have recognized the prevalent bad politics and have been expunging the bad politicians from our boro and trying to on the county level also. For that I personally thank you and want to continue this progress for the good of our boro and the residents of the other towns. Now you even have the oppurtunity to go deeper with your change, even at the committee level if need be. Time for the proper democrat party to represent its constituency. Good luck to us all.

Post #27 Rough 2011 Garwood Property Tax Impact 3/22/11

2011-03-22T13:35:00.006-04:00

The 3 numbers (BOE, muni, county) are basically in now, just a little tweaking and clarification. Here's my latest appraisal of them for an average Garwood assessed house at $104,000. (assessment has been creeping up from $100k due to the Mews sales figures).

From thee BOE prelim budget review report in the March BOE mtg: The budget hasnt been approved yet by the county supt but good chance it will stay the same: (rounded numbers)

The BOE tax impact from the main budget will be a negative ($35). There will be a Question #2: This will be making the half day K into full day K, adding instrumental and extracurriculum courses-(all these are not state mandated). If voted yes, this will add an increase of +$72.

If budget is voted yes and the Q#2 is voted yes the overall tax increase will be approx -$35+$72= +$37 total.

Nice tiny number although as usual I have issues at how the BOE arrived at it. Issues I question: 1) If the budget cap is 2% which is around $120 dollars and the total impact is +$37, why did they have to have a question #2? 2) If the budget is voted down, does that make question #2 moot since there is not a budget for it to be attached to? 3) Why did we cannabalize $200,000 out of the capital projects surplus fund to offset the base budget. Per Mr Bolil, this is acceptable but it is a one time deal and sets precedence that the rest of the $500k left in that fund will now be used up in the next few years. This would leave nothing for capital improvements if they want to open Washingtone school. My guess at this finagling was to make qeustion #2 look good since the total tax impact is "only" +$37. This is called politics and shouldn't be. We will of course bring this all up at the special BOE budget hearing March 27th(date?).

Sue Groning, (& Mr Bolil, et al) had an arduous task in the budget committee spending a lot of manhours so I thank her for all the time freely volunteered by her adnt he committee.

Now as for the muni end tax impact although not approved or futher adjusted we are looking at $108 impact per avg assessed home. This is approximately a 5% increase. There was a budget workshop on 3/7/11 and the mayor said she would like to see a smaller number. Surplus and all the hidden costs seem to be a sticking point among the committee people. There will be a formal budget hearing sometime in late april early may, so the public can really ask the questions. We commend councilman Keith Sluka, who was not on the budget committee, for asking many probing questions at the workshop. He showed true concern.

The county tax impact end was just released and is going thru budget hearings so it is not finalized; They are raising total county taxes by $16.5 mill which is a 6% increase and will as usual will be spread across the 21 towns based on the prior years' assessment from home sales. Since county taxes are assessed on true sales home values, GW avg home sales from the previous 2 years have been creeping up due to MEWs sales so we are probably looking at something around +$100-$125 range but nowhere is it finalized per town yet. Open space trust fund may add couple of dollars also.

That puts the rough total 3 parts tax impact including BOE Q#2 of roughly +$250 for avg assessed GW home. The beleaguered taxpayers continue to grin and bear it.

Post #26 belated but the 2010 muni budget questions FYUI 3/6/11

2011-03-06T19:02:00.004-05:00

(these are questions from the 2010 muni budget review FYUI. post #10 if q's from 2009)
Attn: Mayor and council, CFO/treasurer

Resident review with questions and comments of the 2010 GW municipal Budget

From: Bruce paterson, 325 willow ave, GW, NJ home 908-654-1392 5/1/10

To the boro administrator, mayor and governing body, I thank you for the opportunity in allowing members of the public to comment and ask questions on the Garwood municipal budget. It is also commendable in again reaching out and having the public email any budget questions ahead of time to allow the financial officer to review and be able to have any appropriate information ready at the meeting.

Any clarifications required you can reach me at the phone number above. Please note that in giving answers to my questions, this may elicit an additional question for clarification at the budget meeting. Hopefully all parties look forward to this as an educational venue also since many items and issues get clarified for those not on the financial committee. The format will be in 3 sections and all related to the financials of the boro: 1-general questions; 2-revenue questions; 3- appropriations

(Note: abbreviation: MFC= may further comment. S&W= salaries and wages)

General:
1) What is the present yearly minimum wage to participate in the PFRS and PERS pension system. Are seasonal workers allowed in the system. How many “part time” (less than 30 hours/wk) Garwood muni workers are in the system presently?
2) How many boro workers accepted the $6,000 stipend to opt out of the boro insurance plan. This appropriation would be located in what account code. Is this a one time payment with no subsequent payments the following years.
3) How much has the incident cost the taxpayers out of pocket, caused by the termination of ex-officer Mirabella, which is comprised of legal fees, filing fees and other costs. How much money did officer Mirabella receive when he was terminated; consisting of contractual items. Or did he have to forego all pay due him and all accrued sick, vacation and leave days due him.
4) In the budget are there any costs that are recoded and now are in other line items different from last years line items? (the county does this under the guise of “reorganizing” every year. The BOE did it some shuffling last year and this year.)
5) What is the total $ amount set aside at this point for the recreation area complex project? How much was expended from this line item during last calendar year. Are there are grants that are set to expire in the 2010 calendar year.
6) How many condominium units of the MEWS aka The Pointe are now on the tax records for this budget year. Are there any units left waiting for CO. What is that ratable total broken into muni, school and county taxes.
7) How many units of housing have filed for a tax appeal last year. Also so far for this year. How many appeals have been adjudicated and have we had to remit tax moneys since the tax on the property is less. How much in tax moneys had to be remitted last year. I see sht 20 accnt 36-477-2 has $8.5k allotted for appeals pending.
8) What is the portion of municipal taxes to be received by the Mews Jr project across Chestnut street form the Pointe.
9) What is our total debt including bonds. What is the increase from last year.
10) The RVSA recently has decided to remit another $31,000 apportioned to Garwood. Is this in the budget figures.
11) What is in our “cap bank”. Did we use any of this for this budget.
12) Are the “extraordinary aid” grants from the state still in existence? Are we planning to chase this.
13) How many and who of the governing body has accepted the health insurance benefit.
14) Sht 3D shows we are under “tax levy cap” by $370,909. Is this part of the cap bank process.
15) Sht 3E shows our liability by accumulated absence. We assume the $223,260 is an unfunded liability except for the $15,000 added by this year. Is the Wilde, Wilson and Mirabelli totals now removed from these numbers.
16) Wilde and Wilson retired feb 1st this year. What were the $ amounts of the accrued absence days and other ancillary costs due them at initiation of retirement by contract. Is this appropriated in our 2010 budget.
17) What is our total unfunded liability to date of the PFRS? Of the PERS. The amount we are funding shown on sht 19 of the amounts 0f $48.9k for PERS and $167.1k for PFRS-is this a full funding or portion of what is supposed to be funded this year.
18) How much $ did the library give back to the boro from last years appropriation that they did not use it all up.

Revenue questions:
1) sht 5: accnt 09-200 decreased by $110,000. What is this?
2) Sht 9: accnt 10-713 “Kids rec trust”- how can we expect $101.5k. In 2008 2 years ago it was only $60k. The county is under major financial stress and the 1.5% assessment may be adjusted. Is there appropriations assigned for these moneis.
3) Sht 10: accnt 08-120- sale of muni assets. What are we selling to assume $8k in income.
4) Sht 10: accnt 08-122-“reimb of costs-library” this went up $8k and we are now getting $38k from the library. Is this for higher cost of health insurance and retirement benefits.
5) Sht 10: accnt 08124: “shar5ed service with cranford” what are we offering them. Are there any costs that we are paying to local towns or county that are costing us?
6) Summary Sht 11: accnt 09-001- “state aid without offsetting appropriations”-is this the toatal amount of muni aid that the governor has cut to GW.
7) Summary sht 11 accnt 15-499: “receipts from delinq taxes”- 2 years ago in 2008 it was only $69k. Last year in this line item we realized $159k with anticipation of $90k. This year we forecast $100k. What is the total property taxes that are in arrears and uncollected to date by our residents for the muni/sch/cnty. Is that the item on sht 3A called “reserved”. How many properties are presently in foreclosure.

Appropriations questions:
1) sht 12 accnt 20-100-1 S&W (typ-salary and wages) for admin: This went up 7.1%. Why. (MCF)
2) Sht6 12 accnt 20-110-1 S&W for mayor and council- This went up by $3,000 from the modified 2008 number. I thought there was a rollback for the empathetic sentiment of “we feel your pain”. What happened. (MCF)
3) Sht 12 accnt 20-120-1 S&W for muni clerk- this went up 4.2%. (MCF)
4) Sht 12 accnt 20-130-1 S&W for financial admin- This went up 3.6%. Why.
5) Sht 13 accnt 20-145-1 S&W for tax collector-this went up 6.2%. Why.
6) Sht 13 accnt 43-490-1-1 S&W for muni court-this went up 3.8%. Why
7) Sht 14 accnt 21-180-1 S&W for planning board-this went up $9k or 30%. Big Why?
8) Sht 14 accnt 26-313-2 “other expenses for shade tree”-went down $(10.0k) Is that a type, if not why?
9) Sht 15 accnt 25-240-1 S&W for police- even with breakage of 3 young officers coming abouard there was still an increase of this accnt of $17k. What was the breakage and what is the salary increase to still make this account cost more.
10) Sht 15A accnt 26-290-1 S&W for “streets and roads”-this went up 3.9%. Why. When was the contract up for negotiation and settlement? What was the salary increase terms. Who was involved in the negotiation on the boro side.
11) Sht 15B accnt 27-330-2 other expenses for BOH-this went up 5.4%. Why
12) Sht 20 accnt 31-455-2 “sewer charges’ This went down $183k. Is this a one time decrease by the RVSA. My take is that they are giving back their accrued surplus.
13) Sht 20 accnt 36-477-2 LOSAP appropriations: why did this go down $25k.
14) Sht 20A accnts 36-475 and 471 retirement funding: total of 2 accounts is $194k. in 2009 it was $ok. In 2008 it was $422k. Are we still taking a holiday of full funding of our pension obligation?
15) Sht 26 accnt 44-901-2 “capital improvement”-this is now 40 dollars. We are not planning to do any improvements to our boro assets.
16) Sht 32 last item on right; addnt 2311700- This says our current surplus will be $71.3. From last years budget statement that number was $216k. Does that mean we used $145k of our surplus. Does this mean we have only $71k left to cover any unanticipated issues.
17) Capital Budget sht 33b: the total is $153k. Last year the total was $375k. It appears that we are cashed strapped and cannot make many improvement to our boro assets.

Thank you for your time and attention.

Bruce Paterson

Post #25 My rec complex email to the planning board

2011-02-24T15:38:00.006-05:00

Background: On January 1st, 2011 I was appointed for the first time to sit on a planning board. I considered that an honor but unfortunately I was green to proper procedures. In a 1/26/11 email to the planning board, Bill Neirstedt explained his conversation with an outsde professional regarding the turf field size requirements. In a 1/27 return email to that one, I copied to the whole of the board and (now as a planning board member as of 2011) expressed my sentiments regarding costs and other issues, cost being one of the conditions which was discussed by the board in a previous meeting of the past year (When I was not on the board).

This 1/27/11 email is the one referred to during the 2/23/11 PB mtg by board counsel Fraser as being out of order regarding transparancy since it was not actually discussed in a public forum only by the email system between board members. He deemed it a violation of the sunshine laws. I agree. I had asked him how I can have this email made public to which he replied that it will be included as a record to the rec complex application. In other words anyone from the public can OPRA all paperwork on the rec complex applicatoin and can review the email.

However, subsequent to that board meeting Mr King, a resident, asked if I would post my email that Counsel Fraser referred to. Herewith is the email en toto:

Subject: Re: Garwood Athletic Center
Date: 1/27/2011 12:18:38 A.M. Eastern Standard Time

This email is only circulated among the planning board members since Bill N initiated it (I may copy my thoughts to the M&C later):

i had looked at the field dimensions a while back and agree with Bill N that 50 x 90 was easily achieved by stretching the length. Width appeared to be OK.

Some digression: From the PB q's about costs and the data provided-Reviewing the $ amount charts given out to the PB, it appears we have about $1.3 to $1.4 mill in the bank for this project. Although we as the PB really have no jurisdiction over the cost consideration, it is my opinion that in these financially stressed times, it would be in the best interests of the whole town who are paying for this that a plan should not impact the residents taxes at all yet provide a reasonably acceptable project for all.

Mayor Crincoli noted that the boro would build something for the senior and youth of our town "at no cost to the residents" and I would like to honor his wishes.

I know there is a number of $2.1 mill out there for the entire project and maybe we can knock off the geothermal heating for the field house of $50-75k since that does not make sense on such a small scale. Looking at cost breakdowns, the soccer/lacrossse field costs about $600k so that should be built since its the hallmark of the complex. The lighting of the ballfield was about $100k (?) and there is a grant specific for that. Other elements to be considered are the walking paths, field house, bocce/horseshoe, playground relocation, basketball area, irrigation costs, some sort of picnic lawn area.

If we have $1.4 mill at hand and it costs $2 mill, so to me something has to give. I do not control any disposition but am just bringing this up for any dialogue if one wants.

At the council mtg tuesday, the mayor was asked who makes the final decision to go with the project once all T's are crossed or who makes the decision is anything should be changed if new info impacts the proposed layout. The answer was that the rec complex standing committee has the final say so. There is a meeting of that committee next week per the mayor. Unsure if they now have all information at their disposal and all questions are now resolved for them to proceed with their wishes.

It has been 10 years of foot dragging IMHO and a sudden evolution, but I agree that something can and should be done for our youth ASAP. Unsure if this serves our seniors since I missed the meetings of December and don't see anything substantial (but there is senior related grant monies involved)

I apologize for the lengthy email and I know i wasn't asked for a diatribe but to me after 10 years of watching this closely we are close but not quite there since costs and other elements not addressed are concerns. However as I noted, i have no input except as a resident and leave it up to the members of the standing committee for final disposition. And maybe to the joy of some, I am begrudgingly turning a blind eye toward heritage concerns in the hopes of ending this 10 year journey in exchange for a financially sound project.

all IMHO as a resident and member of the PB,

Bruce Paterson

post #24 The American Geriatric Anthem 1/17/11

2011-01-18T13:25:00.004-05:00

Background: I belong to the Garwood Seniors Club, (how about that). It came about during one year that the club dropped the age criteria to join from 62 to 55 yo. I, along with ex-Mayor McCarthy, joined. They hoped to get younger members but only got 2 since everyone in our age bracket still works and the meetings take place at noon. The next year they raised it back to 62, but Dennis and I are "grandfathered in" (pun intended). In last November's seniors mtg Hank, a gentleman of 93, suggested that at the end of the business meeting we have a morale boosting session where someone either tells jokes, a story, show and tell, whatever. Hank proceeded to tell an off color joke and got the laughs. For the January GW Seniors meeting I came up with a parody song called "The Amercian Geriatric Anthem". I wrote the lyrics to the music of "America, The Beautiful". I handed out the songsheets and Patsy, Hank and myslef led the seniors in singing it, accompanied by the harmonica played by Gene. We all had a great time singing it, and some said they are mailing the song to their friends out of state so it's going national. Herewith the song for you to sing:

The American Geriatric Anthem
Sung to the tune of the “America The Beautiful” (Oh Beautiful, for spacious skies)
Composed by Bruce Paterson Garwood, NJ 12/29/10

We’re beautiful
With spacious thighs
Our amber waves turned gray.

For purple bruises everywhere
Above the aches and pains

Cholesterol,
High blood pressure
Hope Lipitor can cure
Found cataracts in both the eyes
We’re growing old for sure.

(2nd verse)

We’re beautiful
And age old wise
All cures found in a pill

Our walkers shine with chrome divine
We move around at will

Oh Medicare
will pay our share!
Our grandkids call each week
And everyday we exercise.
Retired life is sweet!

(PS: of course we will all know what this song is about, sooner than we think).

Post #23 Garwood Breadbasket list 12/23/10

2010-12-23T11:56:00.007-05:00

Over at the news outlet website http://www.garwood365.com/ they had an entry about pathmark. They called Garwood "the Breadbasket of Union County" which we can't argue. We are less than 1 square mile and there are so many places here. That got us to thinking just how many establishements presently in town are food related. So from memory we ran a list and found at least 34 places involved with foodstuffs. Below is the list. If we left anyone out, we're sorry and please correct us. See also fun with math afterward as we explain the viability of all these establishements.

19-North ave up and down: sugarhouse, cross roads, alphonsos, Mongolian bbq, mcdonalds, quik check, milans, portugues bbq, bienvenuto, rosies, beanery coffee shop, shop rite, Als deli, salad works, dunkin donuts, 7-11, quiznos sub place, burger king, frosty freeze,

9- South ave up and down: Pathmark, taco belle, kings, bensis, roberts, gerrys, mamas, chinchars, aloha bento

2-Center st up and down: lorenzos, don alex

4-Also mentioned: (really can’t just go and buy substantive food but they have food or are in the business) 5 star catering, little joes. Westwood, CVS

Total as of today 34

Fun with math department: If all these places only served GW residents, the per capita numbers would be 4500 divided by 34= around 150 people per establishment. Based on supermarkets averaging $50/ wk per person and if a Garwood family went out to eat 1x/wk spending $10/person avg on fast food or restaurants, we would have (150 x $50 x 52 wks) + (150 x $10 x 52 wks) = $390,000 + $80,000 = $470,000 avg G resident expenditures (revenues) per establishment per year. But that is avg and the supermarkets get the bulk of the revenue stream since all the residents would be frequenting the 3 supermarkets year-round. (that makes the revenues 4400 GW residents x $50 x52 wks div by 3 suprmkts=$3.8 mill each)

Now if you look at the 2 part equation breakdown one sees the supermarkets gets $490k/year, and the fast foood/restaurants get $80k/year from each 150 unit group. This is hardly enough revenue to exist financially just from GW. As a guess operating revenues should be around $8-10 mill for supermarkets and around $300k to $500k for the smaller eateries. Larger eateries like Lorenzos or McDonalds should be around $1.5 to 2 mill as a guess. Obviously, this market is heavily dependant on outside sources of revenue from people in surrounding areas (say from westfielders, cranfordites, clark, kenilworth). The smaller establishments with lesser name recognition really have to sell themselves hard just to exist. Possibly thats why we see some turnover like the portugues BBQ changing hands a couple of times, the corner where don alex is was changing hands many times or the italian place next to mongolian BBQ closing (it is reopening soon a sign in the window says).

The TREE and also Garwood365 always promote that the residents patronize all Garwood establishments as much as possible. Commerce is a vital backbone of our community. This we added as a community resolution in post 22.

Post #22 Community resolutions 12/22/10

2010-12-22T13:55:00.015-05:00

Post #20 were some resolutions for the mayor and council for 2011 and onward. In following up we believe the community can have some resolutions to achieve moving forward also. Each one of us should try to be fully involved in our community and its culture, not only to maintain but to better it if possible. We all have busy lives but understand, as a whole, we ourselves are the vitality behind the boro. This is a heavy responsibility. Pick one or two or more, doesnt have to be all of them but as many as possible. Resolutions are not in any order but here goes:

1) Ask mayor Quattrocchi if you can be appointed to any position or board in town. These appointments greatly help out the community with a diversity of views from the many members involved. These boards actually guide the future of Garwood.

2) Join the celebrations committee. Watching the young children chase for the Easter eggs, or even helping make the holiday tree lighting a success, where the neighbors who haven’t seen each other all year can get together and talk gives a warm feeling during each holiday.

3) Walk to where you are going if it’s in town or even nearby. Garwood’s not even 1 mile long in any direction. Or try a bicycle.

4) If walking, each time pick up one piece of trash or paper and toss it away. There are many receptacles around town on the main roads to toss it in. If we all did this, GW would consistantly be a better and cleaner looking community.

5) Help your neighbors. If it recently snowed, in the morning not only do your sidewalk but just keep shoveling all the way down the block. If you see your neighbor unloading food bags from the car, ask if they need help. Its little things like this that make a neighborhood more friendlier

6) Help your senior neighbors or your disabled neighbors. Stop in to talk. See if they need anything done. Keep an eye on them all year round to make sure they are OK.

7) Go to a planning board meeting, a board of ed meeting, a council meeting, even a freeholder meeting. You don’t have to speak, just attend. You will be amazed the information regarding our town, the surroundings, civic functions, financials, construction, programs that are discussed. This information is invaluable to expand your understanding of the dynamic between the public and the govt. You are certainly welcomed at any of them.

8) There are even recreation committee mtgs, library and board of health meetings that you can attend. They all have a public comment section that allows you to speak if you would like.

9) Attending or joining a church is always helpful in involving people and many times being able to help out in international causes, such as third world hunger or aid relief, by donating through the church. Our spirit of giving is clearly enabled.

10) If you are over 62 join the GW seniors club. They have many functions and meet every other week. Yearly cost to join is $5.

11) Parades: Come out to watch the Baseball Parade in April. Support the community spirit. There is a Halloween parade given by the Lions. You can march in that one if you want, with or without a costume.

12) Join a local organization: Lions, Knights, VFW, different auxiliaries, scouts, Baseball, next town over are the Elks, Rotary, Red Hats, Unico, even Ghosthunters, countywatchers, Mummers, Masons, Quilters and model railroad clubs. Each has a purpose or cause and increases your civic interactions. Check out the media as to what you can join and when they meet. There are even the political clubs (but thats just asking for trouble-LOL).

13) Subscribe to a local paper: The Cranford Chronicle, Westfield Leader, Local Source. There is much more coverage and information on the local level, that regional papers such as the Star Ledger can cover.

14) 12/23/10 Always shop locally. See our post #23. Local merchants are the backbone of the community.

We as a society are starting to become complacent, expectant of entitlements, and become bitter and aggresssive if the boat is rocked. We as citizens are not supposed to become passive but are supposed to be a dynamic between community, government, commerce and labor. Volunteerism and activism is what this county is founded on if one studies how the revolutionary war took place.

Post #21 blog emoticons changes 12/8/10

2010-12-08T16:45:00.004-05:00

Today we had made changes to the blog emoticons at the bottom of each blog entry. Originally, the choices were "interesting", "funny" and "cool". These choices were by default in the google blog. Readers of the entries actually were selecting all three. The choices of funny and cool made no sense to this blog since the entries were neither funny nor cool (although I have been told I write with sometimes a subtle tongue in cheek mixed with hard hitting style). I'm sure the readers were at a loss to best describe their feelings after they read the entry. So those 2 choices were canned.

We went with the more descriptive "interesting" which means thought provoking, "wow" which means this entry was found incredulous, and "can't agree" which gives readers at least the choice that the entry's issue may not be viable to that reader.

Of course one can also click on the comment selection and post a further comment to the blog.

Thanks for reading the TREE,

TREEeditor/BP

Post #20 A TREE wishlist for the new boro council 12/2010

2010-12-07T02:01:00.031-05:00

ongoing draft...(rev 12/31/10) In the beginning of January this will be cleaned up and sent as a letter to the mayor and council for their consideration.

Submitted for your musings:

We are putting this draft in writing and will formalize it by year end, but it's here to peruse as an ongoing list of suggestions for this month. These suggestions are just that and don't necessarily reflect this TREE blogger's opinions. Enjoy the read. If you would like to add any items, please contact me and tell me if you want the item attributable to you or anonymous.

1) When the BOE budget is defeated (seems to be pretty often these days), a committee is formed of the BOE finance committee and the municipal finance committee, along with the boro admin as recording secretary, to review the defeated school budget and make possible cost cut suggestions to appease the voters wishes. This joint committee normally has 7 members and yet the public is told that it is not open for them to attend. When 7 boro officials meet it sure sounds like it should be under the OPMA rules or at least should be addressed as such. We would like the governing body to allow the public to attend and overhear the discussions; and maybe even comment.

2) A committee comprised of residents and boro officials should convene to study just what Garwood receives in direct and indirect services from Union County govt. Rough numbers we have extrapolated is that county budget monies attributable to GW is $4.5 million while we receive only a paltry $200-250,000 back in direct services. The balance of over $4 mill would be for the county's indirect costs such as operation of the prosecutors office, mainteneance of county roads and parks, juvy and correctional facilities along with runnels. Sounds like a lot of money Garwood "donates" and we are one of the smaller towns.

3) We would like to see a proactive approach toward the county govt from item #2 resulting in either lower taxes or more services. In initial quotes of one of the new council members, it appears this may just happen. We have always said that our governing body should be an advocate for the residents to the upper levels. Possibly get the county league of municipalities involved as a concerted effort.

3A) (rev 12/21/10) speaking of Union County-Garwood and the other towns should have councilpeople liaisons down there to each freeholder meeting and report back as either a standing committee or an oral report as to the latest county govt "chicanery" being foisted on the taxpayers. Example who knows that the county is building a huge 40,000 SF 3 story clubhouse and banquet facility at Galloping hill. And ask yourself who pushed for it-noone? Or they now have a Union County Navy duplicating the services of the PANYNJ harbor patrol, the coast guard and the NY harbor patrol?

4) Lower taxes....hey, one could wish.

5) The expungement of a firefighter's record from 2009 now that new grievance procedures are being put in place. The policy is a driect result of what happened to this volunteer firefighter and so he should be exonerated of the punitative actions since its a "brave new world".

6) Return of the boro calendar to the official boro website listing scheduled municipal meetings and boro sponsored events.

7) List the schedule of standing committee meetings whether the public can attend or not. (on boro calendar?) When Boro officials meet to decide directions of issues should at least be made known to the public.

8) Install air conditioning in the boro vehicles for the DPW personnel. They work hard in the summer and it can get hot. A brief respite in the cool cab would revitalize them and prohibit possible heat stroke.

9) Review of all boro personnel contracts, union or collective bargain. One item that may need addressing is certain covenants of the police contract. Example: If an officer retires on February 1st he is entitled to a "bonus" of all sick, personal and vacation days being due him in the upcoming year. And he doesnt have to work through that year, just one month into the year. This basically costs the taxpayers at least $20,000+ everytime an officer retires. If you notice, thats why every officer's retirement date is February 1st. Unheard of in the private sector. Prorate it if anything.

10) Courtesy ordinance to prohibit texting on a cellphone/blackberry during council meetings. While we are at it: have the governing body speak into the microphones.

11) BBB: Bring back bulk or come up with a more friendlier system, although a user fee system would be the most appropriate. (rev 12/31/10) One suggestion: instead of getting a permit, make them aware that they can put out bulk at the curb, but the house that does, will be billed for it. Tracking system may have to be put in place, though.

12) Address overtime costs. One item is regarding the DPW: When a holiday falls on a thursday such as thanksgiving, they get thursday and friday off, then work on saturday at time-and-a-half. Why?

13) Invite the ex-mayor as an appointee on a boro committee. After all he has 20 years of direct boro experience. Plus have the composition of high profile committee appointments be of both political parties and independants. Until recently the system in place left out 2/3's of the boro residents since it was only being done politically during the old one-party rule.

14) RVSA (Rahway Valley Sewerage Authority): Somehow straighten that abusive quagmire out. The $150 mill construction program had overhead professional costs at 50% of hard construction costs, IE $75 mill more. This is unheard of in construction circles. RVSA yearly legal costs are running $500,000 per year to a senator's law firm who personally says he is the political boss of the area. This is all criminal IMHO. But we have only one boro appointee out of 11 members. Impossible but it should be on this list. We are paying for this RVSA fiasco as our sewerage rates went up by 250%! (PS: and don't even think about separating our sewerage costs from our property tax bills.)

14a) (rev 12/23/10) And speaking of the RVSA, whatever happened to our quarterly reports from the Garwood liaison? That ended at least 1 year ago, and the authroity is still embroiled with issues that we need to know of.

15) Hold persons accountable for their actions if it results in financial liabilities to the taxpayers. We just experienced a cost impact to the taxpayers from the "police officer cover-up" of $55,000. This payout resulted from sheer mismanagement in not wanting embarassing actions exposed to the sunlight of public knowledge. $55,000 just because certain someone(s) didnt want a red face?

16) A volunteer parade, just like the old days. The volunteers should be honored by our town. Institute a "volunteer of the year" award.

17) Put the American flags up around boro hall on July 4th, the birth of our nation. Missed 2 years in a row?...sheesh...

18) Finish the gosh darn recreation complex, in whatever evolving form it ends up in. Make it at "no cost" to the taxpayer as per Mayor Crincoli's wishes over 10 years ago.

19) NJ Transit: More stops and better train station. Continue the progress that ex-councilpersons Sytko and Villagio started. One way to get another stop is to canabalize either cranford and westfield's many "every 10 minute" stops for a stop
at Garwood intead.

20) Stay on top of the myriad zoning violations around town. If anything it would give Ann L. a good nights rest.

21) (rev 12/18/10) Transparancy: No more cover-ups just because it might be embarassing to the administration. The public has the right to know since the people are the priority above politics. Reach out to the people. The previous mayor did have a Saturday Mayor's day once a month, but this did not elicit a lot of residents to attend. Was it too far to travel to the center of town? Maybe have a "traveling" mayors saturday set in each voting district held at the house of each voting districts political committee person or just a good neighbor. Even spice up the boro's bi-yearly proprietary Just the Facts newsletter with additional depts on honoring volunteers, neighbor's acheivements or spotlighting boro workers, news from the legislature or even "where our county moneys go". People said they loved the hard copy TREE but the JTF was too dry since it was "just facts". Another transparant move should be: once the road projects are determined which is at least a year ahead of the project, tell the residents as far upstream as possible. That way if they were thinking of doing their sidewalks, they can wait the year and have it done by the paving people for half the price.

22) (rev 12/23/10) Bury the telephone lines underground. It makes for a much cleaner looking environment. Cranford downtown just did that a few years ago. It's probably very expensive but the results are great. Would make the entrance into Gawood more beautiful if you do it all the way out North and South avenues.

23) (rev 12/27/10) Alhough we know its not the true purview of the governing body, bring back the luminaries, the street fair and car show, the June Parents draw the line drug day.
With more and more community related events disappearing in the last 5 years, our community neighborhoods just may disappear also. The governing body needs to re-establish the boro as family oriented.

24) (rev 12/27/10) For the future of commerce and merchants in Garwood, maybe figure out a "underlying theme" to "anchor" all the stores together. Rahway has arts and culture. Westfiled has the outdoor retail mall. Chester has antiques and collectables. Maybe our theme is that we may be the "breadbasket of the county. Maybe have of theme of "Medical" or "Legal". You can't go wrong with doctors and lawyers setting up business in our boro.

25) (rev 12/27/10) Set up a commision to study just what should be considered heritage or historical in Garwood and head in the direction of preserving it. Aoelian? Alcan? The syrup sign on the side of Mr B's? The gazebo, GFAS bldg, baseball field house, North avenue Bus stop, the happy smiley face on center street? Is the first original house built in Garwood still standing?

26) (rev 12/28/10) Create a commission to study reassessment of the boro properties. Considered a third rail issue, reassessment hasnt been done in about 25 years. Possible items to uncover are multi-family dwellings not listed in tax records as such, upgrades done off the books. Although this raises the hackles of property owners, it is all done for fairness so only those who may be gaiming the system may not like it. The study may uncover families that might not be able to afford the higher taxes. That bridge may have to be crossed at that time.

27) (rev 1/4/11) Promote the development of the Casale Property and the Millen property, possibly in conjuction with NJ Transit and the transit village designation.

27) (rev 1/5/11) Start an investigatory committee to study merging of towns or major sharing of services. One suggestion is to possibly share the daylight shift of the police force with Cranford. Another may be to not replace Chief Legg when he retires in 2012, just use the Cranford or Westfield Chief's services.

etc).............to be continued.....(maybe we should have one for the BOE too?)

Postscript: There are those that are marking in the "reaction box" called "can't agree". Unsure which recommendation the poster may be referring to. If you would like to elaborate, you can also send a comment and we will post it under this entry post.

Post #19 Election wrap up- a study of interest 11/3/10

2010-11-03T15:53:00.012-04:00

The wrap up of the 2010 Garwood boro election season. A study:

And the republican tribe of Garwood came out from the desert of governmental excommunication after being relegated there for 20 years of days and nights. And so they arrived in the Politically Promised Land. Paraphrased from the bible book of Exodus

Things always look clearer in retrospect of course. We are recapping this season only because it turned into an interesting one for sure, with dramatic and unexpected results.

The republicans and some residents felt something was amiss when back in March, 2010 ads were run in 2 local papers by the GW democrats looking for candidates. The democrat committee usually has a bull pen of reasonable and experienced people to draw upon for candidates which the mayor usually sets up through appointments to local boards. But this appointment action started looking abusive when the mayor, 3 years in a row, tapped planning board democrats to run as candidates. This revolving door attitude was not well accepted since the majority of those board members ended up with only one year experience under their belt and yet were able to put “member of Planning board” on their resume. All this did was weaken the planning board’s depth, as a new person then had to be appointed to replace the next leaving member.

By the deadline of the June primary, all candidates of both parties were set. The slate was to fill the mayor’s seat open every 4 years and 2 council positions of 3 year terms usually up for election every year on a rotating basis. (Both incumbents, cnlmn Styko-R and cnclmn Napolitano-D were not going to run again). On the republican side was Patricia Quattrocchi for mayor and ex-councilman Vic DeFillippo and new-comer Jim Mathieu for council. On the democrat side was incumbent Dennis McCarthy for mayor and ex-councilwoman Kathy Villaggio and new-comer Matt Allouf for council. One indicator that something may be brewing was the vote count in the primary. During the primary any voting is just for their own specific party candidates and is not a battle between the polical parties. All party votes stand on their own. Normally the democrats have more turnout than the republican side. But in this primary the republicans actually had about 100 more republican voters participate than the democrat side. This did raise some eyebrows on the democrat side.

Through the summer both parties started their foot campaigns by going door to door. The issues discussed with the residents were: on the GOP side-the abrupt bulk pick up cancellation, boro worker raises given in this economic climate and our incessantly increasing taxes. On the democrat side was what they had accomplished for the town, a shortcoming that the GOP mayor candidate does not own a home in town but rents, and a fault that one GOP council candidate had a terrible track record of attendance when he was a sitting councilman. Letters to the editor started to appear in the local papers that were endorsing their candidates. September then arrived and the campaigns went into full speed. There were fundraisers held for both party’s candidates. The republicans who usually reach out for donations by mail to party loyalists instead decided to do the local meet/greet/food/music route at a local rented hall. The democrats did their tried and true route of holding fundraising parties at a party loyalist’s home.

In late September an non-partisan political action committee called End Self-Serving Politics (PAC ESP) came onto the scene with a door to door flyer attacking the mayor’s problem of weak leadership. There was a second flyer from the PAC in the second half of October questioning candidate Kathy Villagio’s allegiance to Garwood since she works for the county government. The PAC called these flyers anti-campaign flyers, but they can be categorized by the subjects who are under attack as “swift-boating”. “Swift boating” is a general action by non-partisan third party groups questioning the leadership or qualities of only certain candidates who are running. The PACs are completely separate entities from any political parties. This type tactic can be effective if it has merits. They apparantly did since none of the issues were not fully refuted by the candidates. In review: the first PAC ESP flyer had the boro seal on it and the header said “from the desk of the mayor of Garwood”. What it humorously parodied was that the desk was speaking not the mayor. Some were affronted by that misleading info but as pointed out within the flyer, the mayor did the exact same thing by abusing the boro seal and header in campaign literature in the 2009 campaign season. Political operatives cried foul to the boro administrator but since the abusive precedent was set by the mayor himself in the previous election cycle, nothing could be done. It was conceded later by the PAC chair that 2 wrongs do not make a right.

In early October, literature describing the bios of the candidates in each party was dropped door to door. Also early October came a mailer from the republicans that said “you can’t afford the status quo”. in Mid- to late October came the additional campaign literature drops ascribing what the incumbents had done and for the opposition what plans they hope to do.

In a mailer piece from the contending republicans called “ITS NOT POLITICS, IT’S MATH”, the GOP pointed out the high cost of the boro workers salaries and benefits versus the smaller cost of road repaving as an example; along with a claim of transfer of wealth that the incumbents did by cutting services while at the same time giving boro workers a raise. Clearly the GOP issue was the expensive local govt allowed under the present elected officials

In response, the democrats sent a mailer called, “ITS NOT POLITICS-IT’S PEOPLE” and listed 6 bullets of past accomplishments: that the officials created handyman and leaf raking programs, increased recreational activities, led the way for shared services, fostered transparency. They stated that “we value each and every municipal employee”. It appeared as if the democrats were on the defensive but the points within rang true.

End of October and beginning of November, the campaign literature was fast and furious. On November 1st a mailer was sent by the opposing republicans showing Governor Christie and his wife arm and arm with the candidates, and called them "the Christie Reform Team". At the same time a letter by the democrats was sent out by the mayor noting that “at every moment and with every decision, we promise you we have the interests of our residents in mind”. A hand-dropped letter from the GOP Republican Committee Chair stated “we cannot afford the status quo” and “we will fight the county’s endless tax increases and heed your school budget decisions”, obviously questioning the council’s small $9,000 cut from the school budget when the school budget was defeated back in the april BOE election cycle.

One new tactic used by the democrats was the "robo-call". In mid October, each Garwood resident received a recorded call endorsing the democrat candidates for mayor and council. (Unknown who's voice was on the recording).

On the NJ.com Garwood forum were the usual back and forth posts from anonymous posters as to how great the mayor is and how wrong the PAC chair is. To which the PAC chair always responded that the attackers should back up these anonymous claims that he errs in his statements. However, none of the anonymous attackers could come up with any justification against the PAC claims. This obviously helped the validity of the issues brought up by the PAC ESP flyers to those readers who follow the forum. Near election day, an anonymous political operative posted a scurrilous personal attack on the republican mayoral candidate finding fault with her past husband and present husband, all untrue and unfounded. This post was immediately removed from the Garwood forum.

There was action in the Westfield leader also. In the late October edition, there was a letter to the editor from a senior couple, who signed off endorsing the democrats, attacking the PAC ESP flyer and the PAC chair's sporadic attendance at the senior meetings. In the same newspaper edition was the candidate bios again, and an interview with the republican candidates but not the democrat ones. The democrats missed the deadline it appeared. There were statements from both candidate groups and a “down-home-sounding” letter from the GOP mayoral candidate stating, she and her family lived here for 30 years, and she will restore a strong leadership to Garwood.

And the campaign was not without incident. In mid October a 13 year old youth while delivering the PAC ESP flyer on Myrtle street delivered it to the mayor’s house and had the mayors wife come out after the minor to allegedly confront him with uncomfortable questions. The PAC chair after being told this by the youth and his mother subsequently allegedly confronted the mayor’s wife about the intimidation. That night, the mayor used two police officers to go to the minor’s house and request the parents to come to boro hall where the mayor and his wife apologized. Then the mayor’s wife had the parents sign a statement describing the mayor’s wife's side of the story and giving consent if it ever needed be read in a public forum which it was at a later date. This signing was done while the police actually stood over the meeting. This was an odd set of events. At a subsequent council meeting, the mayor, his wife and her supporters set up a clandestine attack on the PAC chair during the public speaking portion in the hopes of marginalizing the episode of the mayor’s wife's intimidation of a minor and the possible abuse of the police and boro hall in the incident. It was considered abuse since none of that bullying incident had anything to do with the boro and its operations so the police should not have been involved. But the reason given by the mayor's wife of the use of the police was because she feared for her life from the PAC chair who lived nearby the youth's house. Some residents found that hard o believe. It was during this council meeting that the letter signed by the minor's parents was read aloud.

The second incident took place within 2 days of the election. Two mayor McCarthy supporters sent bulk emails out from their personal computers calling one of the republican candidates and also the PAC chair, “creeps” and “rude” and to vote for the democrat candidates. The PAC chair receiving the email with the alleged aspersions then responded to the bulk email list that all readers should ignore the political operatives and that one should vote their conscience either republican or democrat. But in the PAC chair’s email was a possible legally actionable statement about one of the suporters who had sent the email, to which that supporter’s wife took exception and by a phone call wanted a formal apology. The PAC chair complied. She also demanded her husband apologize for using the childish term “creeps”, which he then complied. One could see the emotions rising leading up to the election. As one email recipient later responded: these emails were all uncalled for and the political party behind it should be embarrassed.

Then came Nov 2nd Election Day. The final results were surprising as the republican contenders won not only the 2 council seats but the mayor’s seat also. This hasn’t been done in at least 18 years.

Why did the mayor cause his seat to be lost? After all, it was his to lose. As the past democrat political party chair of the boro proclaimed once, “This is a democrat town!” The registered voters are indeed 3-2 in favor of the democrats. The governing body over the last 20 years has been majority democrats and most of the time has been 100% all democrats. So what happened? The political forensics:

It was a myriad of items, some large many small. Yes there is the anti-government backlash in motion nationwide to which the local GOP received some advantage. There is also the residents now thirsting to become more informed as to what our government in doing, since the residents are busy and not able to watch them. But as I see it, and as one of the political academics of the town, it was a lot more. The 2 biggest items that felled the democrats were: 1) the abrupt bulk pick up cancellation, and 2) always the incessant tax increases; even after we have been receiving that “extraordinary tax relief” during the Corzine years. The abrupt cancellation of the bulk was a decision by the finance committee of the council and was the direct result from Gov Christie's rescinding of municipal aid to GW. This had the residents irate primarily because it was so abrupt. It actually was cancelled after the last pick up with no warning in early March. People that figured they could wait until summer to dispose of their bulk were out of luck. The council should at least have given notice to the residents of one last pick-up. Plus there was no fall back plan afforded the residents. The total absurdity that came out of this was that when the majority democrat governing body agreed to cancel bulk, that actually gave the republicans a second issue to take advantage of outside of the normal tax increase issue. The governing body could have actually kept bulk and just had higher taxes which the residents would already be complaining about. And the resulting higher tax impact still would have been within the mandated acceptable tax “cap” set by the state.

The democrats year after year had always crowed about giving the residents the “services you have come to expect”. They failed to deliver (or in this case “pick-up”) on their mantra and the residents took them to task. The republicans capitalized on this also by pointing out that the boro workers still got a raise while services were cut.

Other factors in play: there were residents that faulted the mayor for not cutting enough “fat” out of the defeated school budget, although it actually was not specifically in his hands to do. He was blamed anyway for it. Even his mishandling of the Rahway Valley Sewerage Authority appointment and the huge sewerage cost impacts were noted by the residents as partly responsible.

In addition issues that helped to slowly chip away at the mayor’s win cushion: He alienated the fire department by enabling the suspension of a fire fighter on a minor item, yet having 2 criminal charges totally dismissed on a GW police officer who, it turns out, is the brother of a Union County freeholder. This police officer incident and dismissal was covered up from the residents and even from the boro council. Some residents were mad at that cover-up. He alienated the heritage crowd and the Lion’s club by having the Lions Club Gazebo planned to be demolished for the rec area yet that info wasn't made public. It had to be leaked out. He alienated some parents because the planned recreational area has shown no construction in the last 10 years except for a tripling in price. The parents that were in support of it now have their kids grown and moved out. Some were incensed based on the PAC ESP flyer that he has his wife receiving grant money as pay through the municipal alliance committee and she did not need to keep track of her hours to get paid, although the tracking is mandated by law. She just got paid anyway. There were allegations of a conflict of interest with the county and his auto parts business and also the county manipulating our boro through taxes. But these last 2 issues may have had very minor affects. There could be many more reasons and issues but these were the higher profile ones contributing to his demise. This was all discussed by the residents, candidates and factions.

In the end, the groups remaining that the mayor had to depend on was his central close friends and supporters, many hard core democrats and those who are afraid of change. The republicans swept the races. The mayor’s seat election results were Pat Quattrocchi 703 and Dennis McCarthy 639 (prior to absentee ballot count.) The council seats had even larger pluralities by party approximately 800 versus 550. Election numbers weren't seen like this by the republicans for a long time. This was an amazing turn of events since for the past 5 elections, the democrats normally held a large plurality toward the mayor’s seat election as republicans and independents could not assail the position.

The governing body make up starting 2011 regarding the 6 seats of council are split 3 republican and 3 democrat and the mayor’s seat is held by a republican. Since on a local level there really isn’t any party philosophy to push, they should all work well together. We shall see if politics come into play through Mayor-elect Quattrocchi’s appointment process. She did state that she will include all political parties and residents in the process. (Maybe she should reach out to the ex-mayor for his possibility of an appointment since he does have much experience.)

The now ex-mayor (starting january) had unfortunately in the past turned the appointment process very political and so left out 2/3s of the residents who may have wanted to be involved; and that became somewhat deleterious to the boro of Garwood. This hopefully will change.

It is now november 3rd and the sun did come up.

We should all thank ex-mayor Dennis McCarthy for his approximately 20 years of service to the residents of Garwood. Good luck to the boro.

post 18A follow up- Big Dawg....got bit 10/29/10

2010-10-29T07:59:00.013-04:00

The council meeting the night of October 26th, unbeknownst to me was set up by the mayor and his wife to be an ambush of this resident in retaliation to my claims the mayor’s wife had bullied a minor in front of her house. Debby volunteers for various issues so she does have a good streak in her. Plus she is chair of the municipal alliance which helps certain causes and puts in time for that although my anti-campaign flyer questioned aspects of that chairmanship and the tracking of hours versus finances. So all in all though her volunteerism she has obtained supporters. They were there to collaborate in this event. I’m sure they felt that it was time this activist deserved to get some heat instead of always giving it. I do not fault them in their intentions.

I hold to the axiom-when you take on the big dawg, you're bound to get bit. Activists are fully aware such things may arise. The only questions are normally where and when. I was certainly surprised at the where and when in this instance, although through postings and the blog I do telegraph my movements for the sake of transparency and so allowing the opposition to strategize at my expense. That’s the price of transparency. I don’t need to hide anything since I have nothing to hide. But this is called NJ politics, as factions try to keep their turf and fiefdoms they built through home rule and hard work. If any of us read the papers, we are fully aware of this system. At the blog's end we will raise some interesting points that came from this event. Since this discordant meeting, and the attempt to excoriate a resident, is now all on public record, any synopsis can be easily verified and all names can be named. However, the minor and his parents will remain anonymous for the sake of having them keep their sanity in all this, and since they did not attend the meeting and they have no political bent. The events as they unfolded:

There were about 25 people in the audience. The make up appeared to be a bunch of republicans, most of the boro candidates, 2 reporters, the regulars, some people concerned about bulk and roughly 7-8 supporters arranged by Debby McCarthy, although none of them said so. A usual meeting has around 7 people in the audience. I felt something was up when I called to Rosemary walking by prior to meeting start and she did not respond…..but little did I know.

The council meeting with its committee reports proceeded as normal up to the public speaking portion. That public portion covered various issues such as bulk pick-up, trees, the Lincoln school drop off, etc. Awaiting near the end I raised my hand, the mayor motioned to me and I spoke saying: I am not going to name names, but an incident came to my attention about an elected official’s wife bullying a minor. However I dismissed it saying it is the election season and the elected official’s wife apologized. But I pointed out that what I did find fault was that the elected official used the police as his courier service and that he used council chambers as his own personal living room for his wife to apologize and I find that to be abuse of power and wrong. I asked the mayor if he felt that was an abuse of power.

The mayor became perturbed and said that the apology was done in the conference room not council chambers. He then asked me if I am going to name names to which I said no. He then asked me do I want him to name names. I replied if that’s what you want. He then motioned toward his wife who stood up and announced she had a prepared statement to read. The statement she read I did not copy down since I was listening, but it may become part of the council meeting minutes. However, the summary of it is as follows: She heard a noise and came to the front door. She found a flyer in her porch saw and a young boy walking away from her house. She picked up the flyer and went out of her house down the steps and met the young boy on the sidewalk. There she politely asked him who he was. To which he responded with his name. She then asked him what the flyer was about adn who it was from. He then read the flyer head and said it was from the desk of the mayor. She corrected him saying it was not from the mayor, that she is the mayor’s wife and politely said good bye and returned to her house. Her reading continued now with me as the topic, that she found fault with me not being within reach and around the area while a young boy delivered my flyers to parts of the town. She purported that she was concerned about the boy’s safety while I was not around. She then continued to note that 2 days later, Mr. Paterson showed up at her house “yelling and screaming, got into her face so close she could smell my breath”. She was very afraid. Then Mr. Paterson left after threatening he was going to tell everyone in town about the incident. She continued reading that she summoned the parents to boro hall where she apologized to them and had them sign a statement acknowledging the incident as she described. Her prepared statement also read that the parents said they were voting for the mayor and they even have his sign on their lawn. (Which they do). She finished by saying that she will stay after the end of the meeting to answer any questions except from Mr. Paterson. The statement she read was 2 pages long. She quickly added verbally: this is not in the prepared statement but the reason she did not go herself to the minor’s house but instead sent the police was because she feared for her life that Mr. Paterson may see her out there and cause a problem. She sat down. I raised my hand and stated: I have a one sentence response, mayor- I said she should be ashamed of herself for intimidating a minor.

The mayor said is there anyone else that would like to speak. Ms. Resetar, then Ms. Baron spoke each praising that Ms McCarthy does so much for the town and they did not understand how I could say such things. They accused me of being wrong and made some contentious points about the incident. Twice I started to respond in return but stopped and then turned to the mayor and said: Mayor, I can argue with everyone outside, the council meeting is not the venue for residents to be arguing with residents. But he did not motion nor move. Ms Baron did state that bullying is an egregious act and not something to be taken lightly when accusing, to which I agreed. The boro administrator also commented from the dais that Mr. Paterson only sees what he sees. Ms Snow then said when she saw the flyer with the boro seal on it she was disgusted and it turned her stomach. She stated she did not want to listen about Mr. Paterson’s actions any further and then got up and left the room. A Ms. Marino simply stated that what Mr. Paterson did was disgusting. Dr. Weiss stood up and said politics has become ugly these days, and that everyone must stick to the issues. Elections have to be issue driven. Mr. Nierstedt noted that politics has become so personal now, that since Mr. Paterson did not talk to the people involved Mr. Paterson did not know what he was saying. Ms Resetar again followed up with similar comments from her previous statements.

The mayor allowed this excoriation to last about 15 minutes. During that time I noted to him twice that this was an inappropriate venue for arguing, a regular attendee and also the Chief of Police were silently motioning to the mayor from the back of the room to put an end to the inappropriate proceedings. But the mayor let his wife and her supporters take their course. Since I was finished commenting in the public portion I said: thank you, mayor, the mayor then wrapped up the public speaking portion, and the meeting went to the end. (As a note, from observance, the council members were completley silent and looked like they did not move through out this public portion.)

On the way out, the reporter from the Westfield Leader commented to an attendee, this looked like some major damage control.

If I left anyone or anything of importance out, please contact me to correct the blog. I was busy listening to the supporters and may have missed jotting down notes.

They said much about me, but in actuality the way this council and ambush was handled it tells a lot more about themselves. As for the points that are raised:

*Ms. McCarthy already knew exactly what the flyer was about since it was delivered to about 75% of the town at that point and was already in circulation. She admits in her prepared statement to coming out of the house and down the walk after the minor. So that action in and of itself was setting up a confrontation. She also would know that a 13 year old minor would know nothing about politics but she asked pointed questions about this flyer apparently knowing he would be uncomfortable. She knows she is an adult, she knew he was a child. In coming after him and questioning him, making him uncomfortable, these are all red flag indicators of intimidation which is bullying in its basic form. In fact he went home soon after and told his mother he was upset about what just happened. He told his mother for the other upcoming flyer he wanted to deliver that he is afraid to deliver to that block because of the meeting of the mayor’s wife.

*Having the police pay a surprise visit to the parents house, having the parents come down to the boro hall conference room, having the police actually standing present at the meeting in the small spartan conference room where the mayor's wife asked the parents to sign a document drawn up by her: This sounds a little too much like WW2 Germany tactics. The mayor's wife noted at the council meeting that the parents signed that statement and also said they would vote for the mayor. During WW2 German citizens or partisans "picked up and brought in" would want to say anything "they" wanted to hear, or sign anything put in front of them just to get out of the "interrogation room"? These parents are not political and did not want to be involved further. The notification process was wrongly handled. If anything, she and the mayor could have been escorted by an officer to the parent’s house; or she knew their name and where they lived, so she could have just called first; or even had a cop car waiting down the street while she went to the house. She is not a demure person so really did not fear for her life because I might see her.

*The apology, getting some signed statement from the parents, reading a prepared statement in public, and the attempt at publicly discrediting an accuser at a council meeting by her arranged forces tells a story. The Westfield Leader reporter and others saw this as indicators of damage control.

*Rosemary Snow said it was disgusting that the boro seal was used on my campaign flyer and it turned her stomach. If she read the flyer she would have realized that the mayor did the exact same thing last year in abusing the boro seal and letter head on campaign literature. Even though he may be the mayor, the seal is not to be used and is considered campaign abuse, since it misleads residents into thinking it’s an impartial missive coming from the boro itself. But I do now concede in doing the same thing 2 wrongs do not make a right. (Rosemary, don't forget to tell the mayor he turns your stomach too about his same type abusive campaign piece from last year; or is being democrat chair of GW mean everyone is wrong but the democrats.)

*During and after this episode various people I had talked to all say similar statements that she is an imposing figure and has a loud sharp way of speaking even if speaking normally. So just her physiognomy alone normally creates an intimidating presence, so to a 13 year old, she would be fairly scary whether she was bullying or not. But she apparently had used this same modus operandi on two merchants a few years back when they offered to distribute the TREE newsletter free to residents. One actually said she threatened him and his business. Big Dawg’s been barking for a long time now.

*The mayor never did answer my question as to whether there was an abuse of power.

Bottom line is we have just watched how wars can escalate. This situation was handled poorly on my end and the mayor’s end. The incendiary point was when Debby came out of her house after the minor. If she stayed inside this whole episode would not have happened. Debby allegedly bullied a minor, I allegedly bullied Debby, and Debby’s supporters allegedly bullied me. The boro seal was abused by both parties over 2 years of campaigns; there was an abuse of the police, boro hall and the council meeting procedures. But except for whatever repercussions and gossip go through the town and how it’s chronicled further, the episode shall not go any further. The election is upon us, and November 3rd the sun will still come up. If the status quo remains or even it changes, if one thing comes out of all this, it is that at least the man-hours expended doing municipal alliance work will be tracked appropriately. Small victory won, but everyone of us involved lost.

Post #18 Bullying, threats, intimidation: A most perculiar incident 10/17/10

2010-10-22T08:36:00.007-04:00

10/21/10 A most peculiar incident:

During the preceding weeks of campaign season leading up to the election, competition for elected offices becomes heightened. Tensions and desperation become palpable as the candidates and their committees start to take a “win at all costs” mentality. This brings out the worst in people who may harbor a disposition toward negative actions. And sometimes it can get out of hand. The following incident could become toxic if allowed, but this blog will not mention any names.

The incident happened on a Sunday October 17th, approximately 2 weeks before the election. A Garwood young adult age 13 was delivering a campaign flyer for a political action committee. He was being paid to deliver them on the south side of town and was proceeding on this one street in particular where a certain high powered Garwood politician lives.

As he dropped off the flyer at this particular house, this politician’s wife came out; “storming” could be an apt description. She confronted the young adult on her lawn and started giving him the third degree: Who are you? Who are you delivering this for? This is all lies! etc. He responded in as best a pleasant way since this was an adult. He answered politely while at the same time feeling much intimidated by her actions. They then both went their ways, while the youth was a bit shaken but continued to finish delivering down the street. At the end of his route he told his mother what happened. They were both fairly upset and wanted to tell the chair of the political action committee but unfortunately he was away.

The incident could be legally described as an adult bullying a minor. This should have never have happened.

The chair of the political action committee upon his arrival home Tuesday was appraised of the bullying incident on this minor. This chair was outraged such an incident could happen but at the same time was fully cognizant of the normal abrasiveness of this bully. He immediately went to bully’s house and confronted her saying (not necessarily these words in order) that she must stop this intimidation or further action will be taken, that she should be ashamed of herself intimidating a youth. This bully countered in a sweet voice that she was only asking questions and that if the chair would like to talk about it he could certainly talk to her. The chair told her the residents know exactly how she normally acts, and don’t try the sweet BS on him. He then drove away.

The incident then took a very strange and quirky turn. That Tuesday night at around 8pm, approximately 2 hours after the chair confronted the bully about her actions, 2 police came to the young adults home. The parents upon opening the door became worried that their other teenage son was in trouble or that the parents did something wrong. The lead officer calmed them down and explained that the high powered elected official and his wife invited the mother and the youth to come to council chambers, where the elected official’s wife could apologize. The mother was not ready to immediately go so the officers said to take their time and the official will wait. Being late, only the parents went to boro hall and the son stayed home. There they met with the official and his wife and she graciously apologized to the family for the incident. Damage control was swiftly done.

No charges will be filed for this bullying incident. This is election season. The wife can be abrasive and obnoxious and has a past record of intimidation. She had actually threatened two Garwood merchants who were good enough to distribute a local “underground” community newsletter a few years ago. As a note no charges were filed for those incidents either. Possibly her political capital is running out and serious charges should be pressed if her destructive actions continue to persist against the boro merchants and residents. There are now 3 witnesses to her intimidation.

From this only one question arises: Why were police involved and summoned to the unfortunate bullied minor’s house. No charges were neither filed nor legal actions taken. If anything the police should have been summoned to go to the adult bully’s house not the other way around. This has the appearance of an abuse of power on the elected official’s side and we wonder if that was intimidation also. After all there is a witness that the elected official has also threatened in the past. It appears to run in the family.

Post #17 July 4th God Bless America 2010

2010-07-04T15:50:00.001-04:00

Today, in the present, just as it had been so many times in the past 2 centuries, our nation’s peoples have seen strife and stressful times, have seen war and internal battles of brother against brother, have seen depths of poverty and the broad brush of hatreds toward race, religion, or gender. In every time from then, we have prevailed, and shall prevail in every time going forward. We the people, together, are the United States of America.

post 16 Review-The Cartel Movie 4/20/10

2010-04-20T09:57:00.003-04:00

I had the chance to see the special showing of The Cartel at the WF Theater Monday night. Bob Bowden the documentarian took to task the teachers union (NJEA only), the admin costs, the abbott district costs, tenure, class and student unit costs. He noted the government backed education systems ludicrous support of only magnet schools while disavowing and actually destroying the attempts to get a charter school system initiated and the perceived reasons behind that.

It appeared his main agenda in the movie was solely to get a voucher type system in place since the present system is a monopoly as he noted.

Items I agree with is that there should be a voucher system in place for competition in education that was the primary platform issue that had me support Schundler for governor back in 2002 (and hwo is presently the NJ state Education director. I disagree with his stance on getting rid of tenure. It just needs to be jiggered to remove bad teachers only but protect the performing ones from financial-only decisions.

Lastly he noted all sorts of unit numbers per class, per student yet he never even addressed spec ed issues and how they affect this education system in place. Spec ed (not just talking ADD and minor functionality problems) as it is set up may take up 10 to 20% of a districts budget to address only 2-3% of students involved.

This skews Bowden’s numbers but he did not recognize that. He just used raw numbers, but he just basically wanted to get his certain point of views across.

He had a Q&A afterwards in the theatre, with some interesting questions from the audience. My guess was that the audience, watching how they reacted or even their looks, the way they dressed and the companionship/ attendance was at least 50% educators. People demographics were mostly in the late 20's to mid 30's, not many seniors either.

Interesting that he only interviews Powell of the NJEA who i have in the past noted she was a proven fraud. Of course she defended and spun every question he pointedly put to her. It was a sparring and parrying on each of their part, predisposing each others agenda.

One thing missing is that he left out the other teachers union though, did not interview anyone from the AFT.

It was a critique, well timed and accurate IMHO bringing up a system that needs to be redefined and addressed. As he noted in the Q&A, the system is just a patchwork of mandates, political input and corrections one on top of the other as time goes on and items and issues are brought up one by one to be corrected.

The system as it stands is now too jumbled a mess and needs to be streamlined back to its sole purpose of efficiently and properly educating our children.

it was good viewing and interesting as a priimer for activists and for those that are not fully versed on what is going on in our education sytem.

There is also a website (?thecartelmovie.com?)that also notes the upcoming showings around new jersey. Westfield was the closest and was first.

.

Post #15a amended-the plot thickens 2/24/09

2010-02-24T01:14:00.009-05:00

The Mirabella plot thickens amended post #15A-2/24/09.

The council session of 2/23/10 turned into a further interesting extension on the Mirabella incident. From initial post 15 on the TREE blog we re-print here a posted paragraph due to its importance to this amended post with portions in bold to be referenced later:

“Maybe this blog will evolve as further answers become uncovered. These questions really do need answers before a solid conclusion can be drawn, however, the government and their participants at all times usually remain tight lipped toward the public and their reticence may portend certain conclusion. There may be allegations and conjecture within based on the understanding of "normal governmental procedures"…..”.

Indeed, we are now evolving. The following transpired this 2/23/10 council meeting night and unfortunately leaves even further open questions as to the workings of our government in this issue. Obviously many in Boro hall read my blog entry on the Mirabella Incident.

We went to the council meeting just before 7 PM like normal and certain parties were waiting to discuss our blog post. First we will note the conversations that took place, then the problems and further unanswered questions.

Just before the council meeting the Chief of Police met me at the door and he and the internal affairs officer wanted to clarify the information on my original blog post #15 regarding how the Mirabella incident was settled. The chief explained that during the negotiations the attendants were the internal affairs officer, the accused officer and the officer’s 2 counsels (the officer had 2 counsels representing him). In the meetings, financial aspects had to be considered, that if he was suspended the boro would still have to pay his salary while the judicial proceedings take place which could be up to 6 months. He explained similar situations happen many times in other towns (which suddenly did not give me a fuzzy feeling of our state's law enforcement system, but I digress.) We told him we understood that already because the boro attorney noted this info the other week. The council session then started so we had to part. The chief said that they wanted to make sure that the officer would not be hired as a policeman again, but we responded that since all charges are now dismissed and are in the process of being expunged, there is nothing to stop him from being hired as a police officer again, even down at Union County where his brother sits as Freeholder.

In the council meeting was the second time my blog was addressed. This was during the public speaking portion. Boro attorney Renaud had read my-as he called it-“12 pages of drivel” and wanted to point out where the many lies were found. He started off his speech with “this drivel is all just my (re: Bruce’s) opinion” but when we pointed it out that that was his opinion he said, no this is all facts. He actually found fault with only 4 paragraphs, read each one out loud to those in attendance and then explained why each one was a lie. Generally, it fell into 3 categories which we will discuss, with the response after each:

Fault item #A- (regarding our blog item #11)-the settlement agreement did not mention that the criminal charges would be dropped as the blog claimed the settlement did. Also, he found fault with the timeframe that was noted in the blog regarding our claim the parties involved in the settlement agreement signed after the council meeting, subsequent to the council voting on resolution #09-265 accepting Officer Mirabella’s resignation.

Response #A: these 2 items are actually minor in nature. The settlement agreement released Mirabella by specifically stating “dismiss all disciplinary actions”. He is right about nothing being said in the settlement about dismissing “criminal charges” butwe did not specifically state the agreement said it. But lets look at the timeline: it was actually on 9/14/09 that the charges were dismissed and that date is before the settlement agreement date of 9/22/10 so this burden of charges was already released. The written settlement therefore held the inherent understanding that the criminal charges no longer existed along with all other charges or claims being dismissed. The settlement by wording cleaned up any further actions against Mirabella. As to when the settlement agreement was actually signed, the Boro attorney found fault with my saying it was after the council meeting but did not mention exactly when it was signed. But upon study the settlement agreement was signed by the mayor and dated 9/22/09 the day of the council meeting. We could only hope that the agreement was not signed before the council meeting because in the council meeting the resolution had to be voted on first before it gets signed; that is, unless an assumption was made by certain parties to decide to sign it prematurely knowing the council was not fully aware of the situation and would automatically consent. Nor could it have been signed after 9/22/09 since the date could be considered falsified since there was a notary public affirmation involved. “Normal governmental procedures” should have the settlement signed, dated and notarized right after the council voted at the council meeting, but the boro attorney found fault with that. However, this contention was minor in nature for this fault item #A.

Fault item #B-The boro attorney referred to 2 paragraphs (the blog paragraph #8, 10) noted that we stated in the blog that the boro attorney was involved in the ongoing process of the negotiations and the settlement of this matter. The boro attorney said he was not in attendance at all, but just drew up the settlement.

Response #B: So he was involved. But this brings up major troubling aspects. How could an attorney draw up any settlement without knowing the particulars? Are there notes, written conversations or other correspondence that was not forwarded to the public when the public requested it by OPRA? Best guess is that the settlement may have had many drafts but the boro attorney did not say that in the council meeting. And if this was a boro based incident why wasn’t the boro attorney attending at least 1 meeting to make sure the interests of the boro and the interests of the people are being addressed since that’s what we are paying him for? Did the boro really leave the negotiations solely in the hands of the internal affairs officer without boro legal representation on our side while the defendant had 2 separate legal firms representing him on his side and well versed in this type of negotiations? This almost guarantees a lopsided settlement in favor of the accused officer. Why wasn’t our boro attorney involved? This makes no sense from a “normal governmental procedures” standpoint. Something seriously was lacking. See item #C.

Fault item #C-The attorney noted that the boro was never a separate complainant. He stated that the mayor and boro attorney never even attempted a discussion toward being a separate complainant nor agreed to forego any further actions as a separate complainant against Mirabella. (This was noted in our blog paragraph #6).

Response #C: This set me off at the meeting when it was my time to respond. The prosecutor’s letter we note in the original blog paragraph #6 stated the county waives any indictable action, but allows the boro itself to follow through on any charges. A most egregious action was committed when Officer Mirabella, by way of using building master keys while on duty criminally trespassed by unlocking the door into the confidential domain of the boro financial officer and further went thru the drawers of her desk. This is all on video surveillance tape. This area is under direct purview of the Mayor and the governing body and the area was violated as the summons stated “for no legitimate reason”. If it was any unknown persons from the public they would be considered unauthorized and we could only hope the mayor and the boro attorney would initiate criminal action against the perpetrator. As we noted in the blog, conjecture can be made based on “normal government procedure” which would be the mayor and boro attorney to discuss what to do regarding the trespass and since boro financial matters just may have been compromised. This is very disturbing that neither the mayor nor the boro attorney found any cause to be concerned for the public interests. One has to wonder just which is worst: 1) discussing and then dismissing any further action which should be "normal government procedure" in this instance or just 2) outright ignoring criminal trespass into a locked financial and confidential domain. What was on their mind? For a possible answer one should refer near the end of the original blog #15.

Like we noted further questions now arise: Why is the police chief allowing subordinates to make decisions of criminal nature based on finances. Who gave the authority to include financial considerations of whether an officer would be still on the payroll even though he is suspended. If it’s allowed to be a knee-jerk reaction to dismiss criminal charges based on finances it appears this could be done every future time since the police union contract says an accused officer remains on paid leave? In the negotiations, why was it left solely up to the internal affairs officer to represent the people’s side while the defendant had 2 legal firms representing him well versed in this type of affair? This financial matter and legal representation sounds like something that should have at least been discussed in executive session with the mayor and council and boro attorney.

And this is the second trigger that set me off. It is simply amazing that the council had no knowledge that any of this went on, criminal charges, surveillance tapes, criminal trespass into boro financial area and desk, even decisions decided by financial criteria. In fact to this day the council still would have not known this took place if it wasn’t for the anonymous tip to the Union County Watchdog association and the subsequent unraveling of info on the Mirabella incident.

The council should be insulted and outraged. The council should demand that a committee be formed to investigate this incident and get answers to the questions posed within and the possible cover-up.

They are the governing body Of Garwood and obviously certain parties view them that they are not trusted enough with privileged or confidential information, and that includes even after the settlement was months gone. They were still in the dark until this February, 5 months later.

To the public’s eye this appears to be a pure cover-up or at the very least a full failure of due diligence on the boro's end resulting in lopsided decisions against the public's interest.

Maybe the chief and his internal affairs officer did their best to resolve it in their own way and against large legal odds. The mayor and the boro attorney dropped the ball big time in 1) not watching nor keeping themselves in the loop to make sure the public interests were being addressed and 2) not apprising the council who is the governing body that this was going on or was even finished. This is failure of transparency at its greatest. We stated that everyone should be ashamed.

It is interesting that the boro attorney did not take exception to the rest of the blog #15 dissertation regarding the conflicts on interest and the possible political connections. This may be telling.

In the closing of the public session we thanked the mayor for giving me the time to speak on this problematic matter in depth.

The mayor wrapped up the session by saying, “the council should have asked questions prior to voting on the settlement.” We sarcastically responded, “Yeah, the council is the bad guy in all this”. We find it amazing that the mayor is actually blaming the council for their ignorance on this.

post (16) 2/15/10 RVSA billing and flow calcs

2010-02-09T22:56:00.003-05:00

The RVSA again??? the devious agenda this time against Garwood......draft..............................

Post 15 Subrogation of justice 2/18/10

2010-02-09T22:33:00.011-05:00

Subrogation of justice: A study of the 2009 Mirabella incident in Garwood

First, we must thank the non-profit Union County Watchdog Association (UCWA) with Tina Renna, its president, and also John Paff of the Libertarian party, for uncovering this controversial issue that just may be a subversion of justice. The UCWA got involved due to the connection to the Union County freeholders and Libertarian John Paff is involved because he is a high profile advocate of government transparency.

In this blog expose there are actually many questions that are left unanswered but will be posed within. Maybe this blog will evolve as further answers become uncovered. These questions really do need answers before a solid conclusion can be drawn, however, the government and their participants at all times usually remain tight lipped toward the public and their reticence may portend certain conclusion. There may be allegations and conjecture within based on the understanding of normal governmental procedures, but this may suffice from enough circumstantial evidence for one to draw appropriate conclusions in one way or the other. Every discussion between participants was not or needed not be written down. We apologize for the length, but intricate issues need be explained.

The tip of the iceberg started with an innocuous resolution in the Garwood Boro council meeting’s consent agenda of September 22nd, 2009. It was #09-265 and was for "the acceptance of a resignation from Police Officer Mirabella." It was written short, with no back up and the council voted with a single unanimous aye vote on the total 7 accompanying resolutions. The consent agenda is set up for a mass vote usually on minor technical items of a boro’s operation, normally no questions need be asked by the council and this process is to save time. Afterward, outside, the few residents that attend the meeting noted the resignation in passing as odd, but nothing else. Officer Mirabella at that time had 18 years service as a patrolman, most of it serving Garwood. Subsequently, the rumor floated in Garwood that the resignation was due to the fact the officer was caught using the boro computers for personal business. The source of this misleading rumor is unknown, but with conjecture, it may have been internally generated by someone inside the boro out to the public to suppress any further curiosity, since the true actions were of a serious nature enough to warrant criminal charges The administration may not have wanted the actual purpose to be revealed, since it would be negative publicity. It appeared the boro had clamped down hard. Since the false reason of resignation was tepid at most, this Officer Mirabella matter rested until early January, 2010 of this year.

Tina Renna of the UCWA normally receives many anonymous tips regarding Union county governance and how it affects the municipalities within the county, since that is the mission of the UCWA. In January she received a vaguely worded anonymous tip that a Garwood Officer Mirabella’s resignation involved alleged criminal actions. This piqued the UCWA interest because this Officer Gene Mirabella is the brother of Union County Freeholder Alex Mirabella who in 2009 served as chairman of the Union County Freeholder board. By OPRA (open public records request) to Garwood boro, the UCWA with assistance of John Paff requested and received fairly complete but redacted correspondence regarding the resignation matter. Indeed, it was found to be of serious nature and raised questions as to the process and expediency of resolution. The following is a recap of the issue and process:

The following actions taken by Officer Mirabella resulted in two criminal counts drawn up by Garwood boro. The summary of the actions:

1) On 8/18/09 it was alleged Officer Mirabella did commit “criminal mischief” by “jamming business cards into 2 currency change machines” (inside a local Garwood Laundromat) “which rendered them inoperable and depriving the Laundromat of revenue”. This was caught by the stores security cameras, late at night. He was wearing his Garwood police uniform, but unsure if he was on duty. There was no apparent legitimate reason for his actions.
2) On 8/19/09 (the very next day from item #1) it was alleged Officer Mirabella did commit “criminal trespass” by “using a building master key (of the municipal building) while on duty and entering the locked offices and further open the drawers (plural) of the chief financial officer at her desk for no legitimate purpose”. Again, this was caught by the boro security cameras. He was on duty.

It has yet to be discovered if one was related to the other or were they both separate and independent actions just close together chronologically or even if there were more actions not caught on tape by the alleged perpetrator. No paperwork was forwarded to the public noting the motivation behind each criminal action. On 9/3/09 the complaints were formalized on paper for processing. Between 8/19 and 9/3 an investigation was initiated and proceeded to a potential resolution. The following courses of actions are determined by the paperwork received from the UCWA OPRA request to Garwood boro:

1) On 8/20/09 the Garwood boro internal affairs investigator Capt Distefano discussed internally with the Chief of Police disciplinary charges against the Officer. (Although, no internal investigative report or paperwork regarding these “disciplinary charges” was forwarded in the OPRA response. (A letter dated 9/4/09 from a legal firm representing the Officer references the disciplinary charge date of 8/20/09 but notes they are “being held in abeyance until disposition of any criminal complaints”.)
2) Around 8/21/09 (date approximate) per eyewitness reports at the scene of the compromised laundromat, an assistant county prosecutor did an initial investigation of the charges and the damages done to the two laundromat machines and the second item of trespass into the Garwood financial officers confidential locked domain. The prosecutor assigned internal affairs identification #’s to each criminal action pending final review and determination of action. (Subsequently, the Union County government denied there is any paperwork on neither the results nor review by prosecution and the OPRA request was denied.)
3) The compromised laundromat hired legal counsel and on 8/24/09 the lawyer representing the laundromat noted in a phone call to the Garwood Captain investigating the incident that the victim he represents will comply in any investigation and resolution in this “sad situation”.
4) (The next day) Dated 8/25 a letter from the Union County Prosecutors office stated by determination of their office and in regards to the Laundromat criminal mischief charge they are not authorizing any criminal indictable complaint against Officer Mirabella. (The interesting controversy here is when the county received an OPRA request for this document it was returned that said none existed; yet this letter was received indirectly from the Garwood Boro’s OPRA request. Unsure as to county ineptness, lying or cover-up on this incident regarding the freeholder’s brother and the claim of no paperwork in existence.) The letter further directed that if the victim wanted to file a criminal complaint the county would neither approve nor prohibit this action. The victim, in being appraised of the county, subsequently declined to follow up on any charges. With second hand knowledge it must be noted that no action was taken by the laundromat since the burden of prosecution through indictment and court proceedings would entail further large legal costs to the laundromat owner.
5) During this time, Officer Mirabella was apprised of the ongoing investigation and possible departmental charges and obtained legal council as afforded by his Police Union. This was confirmed in a letter dated 8/26/09 from the PBA legal counsel.
6) On 8/31/09 the determination of the second criminal charge came down from the Union County prosecutor’s office. In the letter, the determination from their office in regards to the Criminal trespass thru locked doors and through the violation of a confidential desk, the county prosecutor determined not to authorize any criminal indictable complaint against Officer Mirabella. (Again, the controversy here is when the county received an OPRA request for this second document it said none existed, yet this letter was received indirectly from Garwood Boro. Unsure as to county ineptness, lying or cover-up on this incident regarding the freeholder’s brother and the claim of no paperwork in existence.) The letter further directed that if the victim, who for this criminal charge is actually the boro of Garwood, wanted to file a criminal complaint, the county would neither approve nor prohibit this action. Since the boro itself would be the complainant on this second criminal charge, this had to be further reviewed by the Mayor with our boro attorney as to what action should be further taken. This would be parallel to the Police department in-house direction for resolution.
7) On 9/3/09 based on standard due process, the internal affairs investigator proceeded to write up the 2 formal complaint summonses for the start of due process.
8) Between the dates of 8/31/09 and 9/14/09 ongoing discussions were held with the internal affairs officer, Officer Mirabella, and the two counsels for the officer and for the boro for possible in-house resolution. The Chief of Police is not in attendance but is kept in the loop since it is his responsibility and oversight of the department. In addition, since the financial office, which was trespassed, is under the purview of the Mayor, the Mayor held discussion with Boro counsel and under legal advisement decided no further and separate actions of criminal complaint with the boro as complainant would be charged against Officer Mirabella. (These actions with the boro as an independent complainant raises questions as to why the resolution toward dismissal when a confidential financial area was willfully violated without a legitamate reason.)
9) On 9/14/09 due to Officer Mirabella being an officer in Garwood, the Garwood judge reviewed the charges and recused herself. The 2 criminal complaints against Officer Mirabella are then transferred to the nearby local jurisdiction of Westfield. In addition by due process, the 2 complaints were forwarded to the state prosecutor’s office for their action pending local disposition.
10) In an email dated 9/15/09, the Garwood internal affairs officer reported to the Chief of Police that a preliminary resolution had been reached: Officer Mirabella would resign, the complaints would be dismissed and his reputation would remain in good standing. The Laundromat counsel was in attendance and agreed no further action would be taken on their end. Garwood boro counsel was in attendance to agree that no further action would be taken on the boro end.
11) On 9/22/09 a settlement was drawn up between the boro by the 2 Garwood boro and Police department counsels for Officer Mirabella for his resignation; that it “not be construed as an admission of any allegation”, and the boro will “dismiss any further disciplinary actions”, and that any inquiries would result in the statement that his “resignation was in good standing.” (Note in page 3 para 4 of the settlement is a statement that, “nothing contained herein shall preclude the Boro from responding truthfully to any specific inquiry.” This is important going forward.) This dismisses any internal affairs disciplinary charges, any departmental charges, criminal charges and indirectly any separate and independent charges by the laundromat and the boro as separate complainants.
12) On the night of 9/22/09 at the council meeting, the council by way of consent agenda and without any questioning and statements voted unanimously to accept Officer Mirabella’s resignation and allow the mayor to sign an agreement pertaining to the resignation. (Here is the egregious act of omission of knowledge on behalf of the council. There may have been subterfuge on part of the higher administration levels to install it in the consent agenda where items of minor technical nature are voted en-masse and the Garwood councilors would not ask questions.)
13) The night of 9/22/09 after the vote of the council, the mayor, officer, and officer’s counsel signed the settlement agreement releasing now ex-officer Mirabella from any and all charges.
14) On 9/25/09 Officer Mirabella tendered his resignation letter to the Chief of Police of Garwood.
15) On 10/14/09 in a final “cross the T’s and dot the I’s”, the state prosecutor visited the county prosecutor’s office to review business and these criminal charges and after discussion signed the summonses that the state “elected not to further prosecute in the interest of justice.” (This raises the question of just what is “the interest of justice” inferred here?)

In January 2010, when this incident first saw the light of day into the public by way of the anonymous tip and of which the incident now was already resolved in ex-officer Mirabella’s favor, a Garwood resident went to the “Garwood Mayor’s Saturday” which is an informal meeting venue for residents to come and discuss issues involving the boro. At this meeting the resident inquired as to what reason was given for Officer Mirabella to resign. In direct contradiction to the settlement agreement that allowed from the public to the administration that “any inquiry must be answered truthfully”, the mayor avoided answering it, instead responding, “It’s a personnel matter”. Did he not read the settlement agreement before signing? In looking back it appears that the mayor possibly was complicit in the attempt to prohibit the information from getting out to the public. Finally by the end of January, the UCWA by way of the Garwood OPRA had received fairly complete information from the boro administrator and the full incident broke into the light of day.

Further at the Garwood Council meeting on 2/9/10 a resident during the public speaking portion held pointed questions with the Mayor and Council on this issue. The resident asked the members of council who had voted on the Mirabella settlement in September if: 1) they read the settlement before voting, and 2) if they knew that Officer Mirabella had been charged with 2 criminal charges. Although, words weren’t exchanged, in their shocked silence one could read their expressions that none of the council had knowledge of just what had transpired in the summer of 2009 leading up to the resignation. This was confirmed by inquiry to 3 council members just prior and after the council meeting. Further questioning by the resident had the mayor defer to the boro attorney for answering. As to why all charges were dismissed against Officer Mirabella, the attorney answered that there are many criteria that goes into negotiations and settlement; one example was that the officer if suspended would have remained on the boro payroll as per union agreement and the boro would have paid for a second officer to take the active duty. This extra cost would remain in place until an indictment was achieved and even then an indictment may not have been guaranteed. As to the question of who was involved in negotiating the settlement with the officer, the resident noted that the mayor’s signature and Mirabella’s signature was on the agreement and then asked if anyone else was involved. The attorney would not answer saying that the resident had the paperwork and could see for himself. This was odd that the boro attorney would not speak on record. Three times this question was asked even pointing out the clause in the settlement that stated “nothing shall preclude the boro from responding truthfully to any specific inquiry”. When the council meeting was gaveled closed, the mayor perturbed, said in a loud voice to the boro counsel so the resident and the media could hear, “Bob, I wasn’t involved in that.” However, maybe he wasn’t involved in the settlement per se although his signature shows he should have at least reviewed all tenets. But he was involved since the finance office that had been violated by criminal trespass is under his purview and he had the opportunity, being he represents the people, to see justice properly prevail.

Recently, on 2/16/10, since ex-officer Mirabella had all charges dismissed he appeared in county courthouse to then have his record expunged. The Union County court administrator stated this hearing was closed to the public. (A controversial issue here is that the Superior Court Judge is Judge Donohue. He is the brother in law to Joseph Cryan who is an Undersheriff of Union County, works closely with Freeholder Mirabella, the brother of the officer and he is one of the main forces behind the democrat politics of Union County and the democrat Union County freeholder campaigns.) The newslink "NJnews.net" stated this is a major conflict of interest. We presently do not know the outcome of the hearing.

Was there any special dispensation given to officer Mirabella? Usually Officers are held to a higher standard of integrity and responsibility within a community. Within Garwood we need to review some incidents for comparative justice:

1) Incident #1: The block in front of a resident’s home was paved and sidewalks redone, all under contract by the boro. The meridian between the sidewalk and curb was replanted by the boro contractor but 90% was weeds and hay-like grass. The resident complained to the boro engineer that the contractor performed poorly. To show the weeds the resident let it grow wild. The boro issued a warning regarding lawn maintenance; however the wording of the warning was ambiguous. The resident appraised the boro of the situation and that the engineer was to review the weeds for a punch list item to the street paving contractor. Despite a major flaw in the wording of the warning, despite that the weeds were the result of the boro’s own hired contractor, despite that this was a resident in good standing with the boro and kept the boro apprised of the situation, the boro still issued a civil complaint against the resident. The resident was forced to go to court to defend his actions even though he did not cause the “root” of the problem. He submitted a guilty plea for expediency and less cost to boro and resident. This resident was put on probation for 3 months and now has a record.
2) Incident #2: A 12 year volunteer rank and file firefighter in Garwood was at a scene of a car fire and was in control of the situation. A Fire department officer entered the area without wearing proper gear and the firefighter pushed him aside for his safety. This firefighter was subsequently brought up on departmental charges for “conduct unbecoming a firefighter” and was suspended for 3 months. He now has a record.

Questions arise that there may have been politics and conflicts of interest involved due to all participants, that controlled this disposition: A) The Mirabella incident involved a police officer who is the brother of the democrat Union County freeholder chairman Alexander Mirabella, who was up for election in 2009, the year of the incident and who did not need a negative incident involving a close sibling just months before the election. B) Union county at every instance during January 2010 after the incident was resolved internally denied OPRA requests from the public for any paperwork regarding any investigations or determinations involving the Freeholder chairman’s brother’s criminal actions, saying none are in existence. Yet it was proven there were papers in existence. This in itself may prove some nefarious political involvement and cover-up. C) The Garwood boro attorney who was involved throughout this investigation and settlement as an overseer of the process and was involved in the advice to boro during the incident is the vice chairman of the Union County democrat committee who guides the selection and campaign of the democrat freeholders including freeholder Chairman Alexander Mirabella who was up for election. D) The mayor of Garwood is democrat and was put in a position to decide if the boro would pursue further charges of criminal trespass against the brother of a freeholder. His involvement is that he has a company that receives hundreds of thousands of dollars of business from the Union County, the business dollars, resolutions and budget allocations voted on by the officer’s brother, chairman Mirabella of the Freeholders. E) The Union County Prosecutors office, who chose not to prosecute the freeholder chairman’s brother is headed by a democrat political appointee who a few years ago was the subject of approved state legislation adjusting his tenure in government in order to bump his pension to approximately $100,000/year. The freeholders indirectly have oversight regarding his department hiring and budget. F) The State Attorney General’s office that elected not to prosecute “in the interests of justice” is a political appointment position under the recently ousted governor John Corzine. The state attorney generals office recently had 2 out of 4 NJ state attorney generals forced to step down under high profile abuse of power situations which raises questions of this department’s integrity.. G) The Superior Court Judge for the final “expungement” hearing is the brother-in-law of Joseph Cryan, a main democrat political force overseeing state democrat elections on higher levels and who works for Union County as a high paid under-sheriff, and who is closely aligned to the Freeholders.

Probably the most baffling item in this incident is the statement by the state prosecutor that they "elect not to prosecute in the interests of justice". This is confusing from a general public viewpoint. But it becomes clearer when the concept of two systems of justice is introduced: One for the public and one for the politically connected.

Some final items to ponder: ex-officer Mirabella since the record may be now expunged can work as a police officer again, possibly even at Union County where his brother is a Union County Freeholder. Time will tell. Plus the public may never know the reasons behind ex-officer Mirabella committing the 2 alleged criminal trespass and criminal mischief actions.

Post #14 The Lions club Gazebo-heritage destruction 1/27/10

2010-01-27T14:07:00.003-05:00

(this was sent to the M&C and local media on 1/27/10) A recent issue arose that the Garwood Lions Club Gazebo at the baseball field may be in the crosshairs of certain boro parties, to be demolished for a bigger field house as part of the new recreation complex. This is a revision to the previous plans of 2 years ago. The gazebo is considered a heritage structure by some since it was hand built with donated materials by the Lions Club members in 1978. With this issue, there has been no transparency from the boro in having the people even aware that this is being considered, this info luckily had trickled out to the public by a local boro newsletter. In Sept 09 members of the Lions Club came to a council meeting to express extreme displeasure over any upcoming intentions to demolish this heritage structure.

On January 1st in the mayor’s state of the boro address he said that hopefully ground will be broken for the recreation complex this year. In last night’s council meeting, a member of the public stated that the M&C have no rights to single handedly decide to demolish a boro heritage asset such as the gazebo. Subsequently in last night’s council meeting, it was said that there are no revised finalized plans created yet for the project, and that there are only sketches at this time that do include the demo of the gazebo; but the tainted fill/EPA problem at the site suddenly arose and this was put on back burner. This seems odd since ground may be broken this year with no plans yet.

Questions arise: 1) who gave the committee the right to even consider the demo of the heritage gazebo structure. If in the council standing recreation committee, the members suggested to the design architect that the field house should be made bigger and the architect took it on him-self to then intrude on the gazebo footprint to increase the house size, someone on the rec committee should have at least said: “Stop! This heritage structure should not be touched. Let’s expand it elsewhere.” It appears no one did that, so we have just entered a slippery slope. 2) In so doing, with now tacit consent, did the standing rec committee then reach out to the Lions Club to tell them their direction? The answer is: No. A person who belong(ed) to the Lions Club spoke at a council mtg mid last year saying any plans are good for the town and its children, but he preceded that statement saying that he was speaking only as a resident and not as a Lions club representative. He also later said he wasn’t aware of the gazebo destruction. The public is left out of this loop and now we are further down this slippery slope. 3) September 2009 had many members of the Lions Club come out to the M&C and stated their displeasure. This is the only public input to date that says "no" to the gazebo demolition. So then why are the sketches still being considered, unless there is an ulterior motivation pushing this destruction forward? 4) Still on the boro website are the plans and costs of the original rec complex from 2 years ago. If the complex is being revised and sketches are in existence, aren’t these boro website plans misleading the public? Shouldn’t there be a statement right across the original plans that these are being readdressed? With the ground now planned on being broken this year which at the latest would be September due to the construction season, there would be a rush for layout, design, internal approval, crossing all T's, then introduction to public, a public presentation, hopefully waiting for public feedback for transparency, then final go ahead and finally going out for bids and voting to award. All this will be in the next 7 months? This is the bottom of the slippery slope. The plans including the destruction of the gazebo obviously would then be formalized and, guaranteed it would now be past the point of no return. That is the utter shame of how this government works with their agenda without transparency.

In last nights council meeting, on a separate issue, 2 councilmen noted multiple times that the people should not perceive the council as top ended making decisions without the public's input. This gazebo issue disproves that, unless the council comes to their senses and readjusts their agenda to be more resident friendly.

There is still time to be transparent. Indeed, maybe 98% of the town wants to see the gazebo demolished for a bigger field house. Maybe the field house can be expanded or relocated. Yet right now 98% of the town doesn’t even know what is transpiring with the gazebo and field house, until the plans are in front of the council to finally vote on and too late. The only public input to date was "no" and is it being ignored? This is a travesty in the making.

post #13 transparancy of companies doing business with the government 7/30/09

2009-07-30T09:21:00.003-04:00

There should be a push for better transparancy in business' that deal with all government entities—-have on record for public review, the principles (silent, minor partners or otherwise) of all enitites that wish to do work, offer service or provide materials to the public entity. It is our taxpayer dollars going to that company that the gov entity just hired so we have a right to know who is receiving the tax dollars. Even if it is an LLC type company wanting to provide toilet paper under the bid threshold, legal, arch, eng firms, realty firms involved in city housing... if they want to do business with the government they have to divulge who the gov is doing business with.

In construction, in public bidding, there is many times forms to fill out such as this if the construction company wants to bid the gov constr contract and win the work.. It should be across the board.

As an activist i visit other activist websites of course. I posted this on the "NPCCR-north plainfield citizens for community rights". The website link is below if you like to visit the site.

http://communityrights.wordpress.com/

post #12 the travesty of the GFD hearing 6/8/09

2009-06-09T06:44:00.002-04:00

6/8/09 As I write this on the eve of part 2 of the grievance hearing about a volunteer fireman up on charges of insubordination. I have to comment before the outcome which possibly is to be decided tonite at this next council executive session. My concern here is as a taxpayer of GW who is paying for these sessions.

From what I gather prior to cloture placed on this case, it is a case of a judgment of safety decided by a rank and file fireman at a point of a car fire incident and is relating to a GWFD officer that the rank and file had determined entered an unsafe and unsecured area without wearing proper gear for that incident. The rank and file fireman pushed the officer aside, fearing for this officers safety.

And it escalated from there; that to me was based on nothing but a bruised ego and subsequent internal department politics.

There was no harm, personal injury nor calamity done to anyone involved. Subsequent to the incident, in normal processes there are many levels or resolution that could have quickly ameliorated this case.

The first level was at the incident site. Right after the incident the two firemen involved should have discussed, apologized agreed to some sort of recommendation and gone their way. Maybe later a discussion of an existing policy should be reviewed if some action was incorrect. Somehow none of this happened.

The second level would have been an in-house hearing between the two and a third impartial adjudicating member, who may be an officer. At that time there would have been clearer heads prevailing. Why this did not happen is unknown to this writer.

The third level is external mediation of both parties, with or without lawyers. This could have ended the unfolding travesty. This did not happen, perhaps because both parties have to agree to it. Unknown why this did not occur.

The fourth level is where we are at now. The council in a separate upfront fact finding executive session had heard the facts and then judged that this case should be heard by the council at a later grievance hearing. That grievance hearing would be in front of the council in closed executive sessions. It could be an open type session, and from what I understand the defendant rank and file fireman wanted it that way, but it did not happen for some reason unknown to this writer. This is going into 2 sessions now and the taxpayers are paying for the boro attorney to represent the fire department though all this. The case has also gone thru a discovery process outside these sessions also which had taken up more time and boro resources.

At this point, if anyone is reading this, prior to the executive session tonight: I implore those involved to recognize that it should not be at this level. To the council, from what they heard so far they should convene prior to the session and agree that no more tax payer monies should be expended on this. Since they have heard the plaintiff side first and assuming it is actually of minor infraction, they should a) either outright dismiss this case or b) remand it back to the GW fire department where it should have stayed in the first place.

In my opinion, bruised egos nor politics should not play to wasteful expenditures of tax monies. This should have been resolved at a much lower level. Tonite we shall see the outcome.

post #11 a poem for NJ 5/22/09

2009-05-22T13:48:00.000-04:00

(With apologies to Pastor Martin Niemöller)

"In New jersey, they came first for my Washington and Lincoln, And I didn’t speak up because I still had my Hamilton and Jackson;

And then they came for the Hamilton and Jackson, And I didn’t speak up because I still had my Grant and Franklin;

And then they came for the Grant and Franklin, And I didn’t speak up because I still had my work and my life;

But then... they came for me... And by that time there were no presidents left to stop my government."

post #10 some boro budget questions

2009-04-28T10:27:00.003-04:00

In a more proactive stance and as a result of the previous council meeting where this writer questioned the cap bank resolution, Ms Ariemma, the boro administrator contacted me to see if I could have any budget questions listed before hand. This is a good idea for many reasons: 1) it would get me to analyze the boro budget as a resident and watchdog ahead of time to determing any fianancial issues arising so as to not forget to ask them during the budget/council meeting; 2) Since our previuos CFO Sue Wright just retired, this would give some additional time for our new CFO Sandy Bruns, who may not as well versed in the boro finances, to come up with answers at the budget/council meeting so as not to end up saying "i'll have to get back to you". 3) This would allow the many other council members to be prepared and possibly also learn and help in the budget analysis and discussion; 4) This may expedite the meeting since the questions would be out there already and this writer won't have to sit there trying to phrase the questions while on the fly. 5) hopefully it will make the process of my thousand questions a little less dry.

This request I felt comfortable with since it is symbiotic to the posting of the boro budget of the boro website. Now if only other residents would review the budget for their own satisfaction and come to the council meeting to ask any questions or concerns they may have....oh well, step by step into the future. Below is the email and list of questions FYUI that I compiled and emailed to the boro. There may be other questions that arise during the meeting. You are welcome to print out or access the budget and then read along........................................

Attn: Mayor and council, CFO/treasurer

From: Bruce paterson, 325 willow ave, GW, NJ 201-712-5411 home 908-654-1392
4/22/09

I will try to submit the q’s ahead of time. However, there may be subsequent q’s or other q’s I determined after this list was made and I may ask at the council mtg.

Thank you,

Bruce

Ref : 09-172 Garwood municipal budget questions for the april 28th public portion of the meeting.

1) Who is in charge of accounting for grant dollars and if the covenants are being followed correctly.
2) In the budget are there any costs that are recoded and now are in other line items different from last years line items? (the county does this under the guise of “reorganizing” every year. The BOE did it some shuffling last year and this year.)
3) What is the amount set aside at this point for the recreation area complex project? How much was expended from this line item during last calendar year. Are there are grants that are set to expire in the 2009 calendar year.
4) What is our total debt including bonds. Is the pension deferral included in this and how much is that amount.
5) Ref the pension deferral-when will the state tell us the final total of how much we will owe. There is presently a number of $225,000 calculated by the finance committee regarding the total obligation of the deferral. What interest rate % is this based on.
6) How many units of the MEWS aka The Pointe are now on the tax records for this budget year. What is that ratable total broken into muni, school and county taxes.
7) Is the front portion of the MEWS ie. the retail and rental building on the tax roles. What is the total taxes for muni, school and county they are paying.
8) Last council meeting there was the cap resolution voted on with a figure of $51,400. The monies in last years 2008 cap was approx $78,000 per council and for 2009 the total is approx $150,000. But $78,000 and $51,400 does not add up to $150,000. Please explain the discrepancy. Will there be an amount for the year 2010 calendar year.
9) In applying for extraordinary state aid, please explain the formula for determining the stress level of a municipality allowing it to apply.
10) Sht 4 line 08-119 How many entities are affected by this and does this include the recent ordinance 09-08 regarding flow charge increase from $1980 to $2548.
11) Sht 3A reserve for uncollected taxes of $473,543- What was the last years final line item cost since this was manipulated last year for balancing the budget.
12) Revenue Sht 5 items 09-200 and 09-202; CMP went down 443k and energy receipts went up $33k…are these increase/decreast related, or is it a coincidence. If coincidence why did they change. CMP was $360k the year before-is this being phased out.
13) Revenue sht 9-are all these items in danger of being cancelled, like the 10-271 click it or tick it shown as $0 this year.
14) Revenue sht 9A- these 2 items: are they one time receipts and not automatically renewable next year. We will only need it for one time per app sht 25 line 41-177-2
15) Revenue sht 10- item 08-122: why did library reimb go down?
16) Revenue sht 10 item 08-118 and 119 Are these yearly now or one shot.
17) App sht 12 line 20-100-1: increased 11% over what was paid-why? Lne 20-100-2 incr 54%- why
18) App sht 12 line 10-130-1 incr 109%-why
19) App sht 13 line 20-155-2 incr of 57%- why?
20) App sht 15 line 25-265-2 hydrant incr 16% why line 25-265-2 misc incr 15% why.
21) App sht 15 line 25-240-1 police salaries increased 7%, something major wrong here. Why are the contractual increase with the pba for the life of contract.
22) App line 15C rec expenses incr 90%- I thought there were user fees now being charged. This is outrageous unless proper explaination is said.
23) App sht 20 line 31-455-2 increased 20% over paid out. Why
24) App sht 20 line 31-455-2 library-why did we only pay out $177k. did we receive back the difference between the $213980 and 177939?
25) App sht 27-line 45-920-2 payment of bond principal-why did it go down from $168k to 95k….same ref sht 30 line 45-999 mni debt service.

Thank you
bruce paterson

draft....the total tax impact now close to finalized

2009-04-03T09:01:00.003-04:00

4/3/09 draft.................

discuss boro ($170), school ($135), county($110), total tax impact $415 on avg house.

boro-pension deferral, RVSA, mews ratables, extraordinary aid, surplus
school-dereg $, interest $, teacher salaries, transportation, retirement/hire younger offsets, NJ state health plan savings,
county-pension deferral, layoffs, fee increases, golf course,

one shot deals and gimmicks explained

mews condos now paying $12k to 13k/year in taxes. how many on the books now.

draft...matrix teachers versus private sector

2009-04-03T08:47:00.002-04:00

draft.....................

matrix to be published with comps topics and rating points: (may not come to fruition if a matrix can't be posted, may have to figure another way of listing comparisons)

work environ, perform eval, tenure an job security, work hours/day, equip profess, vacation, bonus, holidays, pension, medical, upward mobility, estr-ordiinary income, poltics, starting the job, negotiations, union affects/salaries/raises, end of career salary

draft...the pension deferral scam

2009-04-03T08:44:00.001-04:00

draft...........................

bailout
loan
constitutional
interest rates
actually owed after 15 years
inital borrow
who's doing it

draft....the last depression.........

2009-03-24T08:47:00.004-04:00

draft Post dated 3/24/09:..............................

coming soon--interviews with those who were around in the last depression...........

post #9-Ensuring no pain for the county political soldiers

2009-03-24T05:31:00.025-04:00

(update 3/26/09--before you read the main post, please note the following info: the past planned 3/24/09 resignation request of the mayor has yet to be acted on since that day it would have been considered premature, that the county resolution had not been passed at the time of writing of this original post. So we decided to wait. On 3/25/09 this editor then attended the freeholder meeting to speak on the upcoming county resolution awarding $300k to the mayors auto parts store, Garwood Auto Parts. Odd, but the agenda received that night had a discrepancy from the agenda the week before. The $300k figure was reduced to a $40k amount in the proposed resolution. During the public speaking portion of the county meeting this editor approached the dais and questioned the discrepancy in the amounts. They nor any of their department heads could explain the drastic and sudden decrease. I even asked if the original amount of $300k was a typo giving them a potential out, but they said they did not know. I then asked why after the state directed the local government to go to Advanced auto parts in Linden which the state negotiated an across the board contract of a 20% savings that they did not do that. They stated that Garwood auto parts is a state approved supplier. i asked if they will also get the 20% savings from Garwood Auto but they did not know. Please note that there is a government created auto parts supplier chart listing state approved auto parts broken down into auto parts categories versus cost effectiveness. Upon review Advanced is now considered the primary supplier on the list. There are also levels of 2, 3 , 4, 5 based on cost effectiveness on the list with names such as read auto and garwood auto named. Garwood auto is basically listed as a 3 and 4th tier supplier with a rare appearance as 2nd tier. This means that they are not considered the primary nor even the secondary supplier meaning Garwood auto parts prices are not advantageous to the taxpayers. Still the county passed a resolution to buy from Garwood Auto parts even though they may be more costly. At this time, we leave this post up, even though the numbers may not be wholly true anymore. The county and their soldiers can be evasive and questionable as seen from the freeholder meeting Q&A. Many times as proven by the Union County Watchdog Association's investigations, the county will regroup change direction and funnel money in some other way....can you picture them slinking off saying "curses, our plan is thwarted", and just maybe our blog saved the taxpayers $260,000.......One proof of something afoot is that in tracking invoices, the county always buys at least $75k to 100k worth of auto parts annually from the mayor and Garwood Auto, yet this resolution is for only $40k. Sounds like they are cutting back, no? Or is it they were aware of my post since i put it up ahead of time to shake them and they adjusted accordingly since my actions are known to be monitored by them. Somehow we feel Garwood Auto Parts will still receive the "vig" promised. We will continue to be vigilant in this battle of the people versus bad government.)

3/23/09: Back in December and January, as you recall we discussed the issue of the RVSA and the re-appointment of the apparent malfeasant director Lombardo, who is a political boss of Garwood. There were issues that he is part and parcel to waste and abuse at the RVSA such as directing hundreds of thousands of our tax dollars into this areas major political boss Senator Lesniak's, legal firm coffers for minimal work requests at the RVSA, and having the RVSA hire without interview or resume a person with no experience except to give him a $30,000 pension bump. (see post #6)

We spoke then of the corrupted system that we have in Union County and that if one becomes a good soldier to the political bosses, riches and rewards would come to you, but one has to prove yourself first of course. Subsequently, the re-appointment by the mayor of Lombardo was ratified by you the council.

As a possible consequence of the above, we are looking at this corrupted system rearing its head again. Tomorrow, on the Union County freeholder agenda is resolution #09-310 (#?). This is awarding a $300,000 contract to Garwood Auto parts. This is unprecedented in that we have never before seen such a large amount by county ordinance go for simple auto parts. It starts to make sense when one knows that Mayor McCarthy, the mayor of Garwood is the owner of the auto parts store to which the county is funneling the $300,000 of our tax monies. And this is in contrast to last years 3/27/08 press release from the state of NJ that local governments buy from only a certain designated auto parts vendor in Linden contracted to save 20%.

It appears McCarthy has proven himself a good soldier of the Union County politicians in control of our tax monies, one result which was placing his political boss back in control of the RVSA. And so he gets rewarded with a $300,000 contract.

In this dire economic climate, the private sector is on a cliff, but thanks to the county largesse with our tax monies, the mayor’s parts store is assured smooth sailing without any anxiety of whether the down economy will hurt his business. The mayor now doesn’t have to share the pain with the rest of us folk; so using his position as mayor for the here-in note actions was a good move on his part.

In the past few years, the residents demanded “where is our tax money going at the county”. They wanted studies to make sure Garwood gets our fair share. The residents want a more fair representation at the county also. All this was deflected thanks to the mayor and certain members of the council. And so the rewards from the corrupted system come to those who know how to play this political game.

The mayor has been compromised and simply disgraced his position of mayor for his own gain. By the past voting patterns of the Garwood people, they do not want the county system, or the freeholders, or Lombardo. But the mayor forces the continuation of all this despite that the people have spoken. The people are not represented and the mayor should step down immediately.

The only other choice is for the mayor to tell the county to cancel his self-serving county resolution.

Previously we have asked the mayor and council where does Garwood’s portion of $4 million in county tax money and revenue go. We now know some of the answers; $100,000 goes to councilwoman Villaggio, well over a $100,000 goes to political boss Lombardo and his family and now over $300,000 goes to the mayor; and amazing, this corrupted system highly unethical and abusive is all legal.

We ask you, should these 3 be in control of Garwood? The people have already spoken on one. This year we should have another answer.

We now understand where the mayor is coming from in wanting to continue this corrupted county political system for his own rewards. To the council, we request that you place on the next agenda a resolution of “no confidence” in the mayors actions. We have to bring back integrity into Garwood’s corrupted governance in order to move Garwood forward

post #8-You feel the pain, we choose not to.

2009-03-11T15:49:00.002-04:00

3/11/09: Interesting item concerning the govenment/public relationship came out of the council meeting of Tuesday 3/10/09. This gives further credence to the fact that most of those governing, even on the local level, are out of touch with reality.

Councilman Sytko, who sits on the finance committee, suggested that the mayor and council reduce their taxpayer paid stipends since Garwood is facing another year of poor finances. He set levels of $1000 for the council people (down from $1500) and $1200 for the Mayor (down from $1800). Councilwoman Villaggio retorted abruptly “this is just politics”. The rest of the mayor and council appeared to roll around their eyes and look away into corners of the ceiling. One councilman said, "gee, didnt we have a decrease last year." Seeing the council reaction, the mayor declared that the suggestion is not agreed to and dismissed it.

During the public speaking portion, a person from the public queried to Councilwoman Villaggio as to what she meant in saying “this is just politics”. She responded that she has been giving back $500 of her stipend the past few years and did not need to mention it publicly and that she need not have it reported in the newspapers. She was referring to councilman Sytko being noted in the Chronicle that he is forgoing his stipend due to the boro financial problems. She said “she chose to do this with out publicly saying it”, which we must guess that she thinks if any action by a council person is reported in the paper then it must be politically motivated. This made no sense and didn't even pertain to Sytko's suggestion that the mayor and council vote to reduce their stipend.

A person from the public then stated that both Sytko and Villagio should be commended for their stipend givebacks, KV for her portion of it and Sytko for his total giveback. A person from the public then suggested that councilman Sytko has a good idea and that the mayor and all the council should decrease their stipend as a ‘united front” to the taxpayers who have to dig deeper and deeper, and as a statement that they all indeed “feel our pain”, since the economy is in dire straits, private industry is severely hurting and people are getting laid off and can’t pay their mortgage and taxes.

Councilwoman Villaggio then went on to state that if there are to be “givebacks” each council person would choose to do that, that each council person would choose whether to give a portion of their stipend back to the boro if they want but that it is up to each to decide what they want to do.

Astounded, the person from the public then translated her statement she made into something we all could better understand and from where she and the council are coming from: “You’re telling me that the government chooses whether they also should feel the pain”. She did not argue this further.

So we now understand the arrogance of the government, that they are above us, and even though they make us feel the relentless tax pain and we are faced daily with the question as to whether we will even have a job next week, they themselves have the luxury to decide whether they should share in the pain or not.

Wouldn’t it be nice when your boss comes up to you and says we have to cut your salary, you just say “no, thank you.”

Post #7-the death spiral continues-thanks NJEA

2009-02-18T07:25:00.003-05:00

2/18/09: The BOE mtg of feb 17, 09 had to vote on the teachers contract from 7/1/2008 (past year) to 6/30/11. It appears to this editor that the NJEA had used "terroristic tactics" in intimidating and manipulating the teachers and the BOE into the final contract agreement. The wage increases are 4.5% for 2008-2009 school year (this is now retroactive), 4.3% for 2009-2010, 4.3% for 2010-2011. Before the vote each board member was allowed to comment as follows. I may have not covered every word since i was writing each comment down as they spoke from thier hearts. (this bog entry may be edited later since this was quickly written to inform the public of this sad turn of events.

Russ Graham (who has been on the board about 3 months)-it is interesting learning how negotiations went and what the other towns are doing. We appear to be powerless to buck the system and can’t get by without offering same type contracts.

Barabara Greet (negotiations)-This was the most eye-opening, heart wrenching hands tied process. It was terrible. We are up against the most powerful union, if we negotiated further we would stil be paying even more money. The union rejected all other offers.

Sue Groening (negotiations)- this was a most horrible process and eye-opener. They didn’t want to hear anything different. Next time we hope to serve the public better.

Christine Guerriero- First let me say I am part of that most powerful union. I appreciate all the work my fellow members put into this. I will probably get a lot of hate mail. I am completely disappointed in my union, that during this time of difficulty they cant see that people are facing layoffs and financially hard time, housing being foreclosed. I am not in favor of this contract and won’t support it.

Linda Koenig-I want to thank the negotiating committee. Last time I was on the board during the contract cycle I said I never want to do it again, but I did unfortunately. The union has to get rid of the Starbux coffee mentality and go to quick check. They are out of touch with reality. They are not in the real world. They have their own agenda and we had to be forced to abide by the county averages for salaries. We have to now pay 4.5% and yet our budget is only allowed to go up by 4% by mandate. I now tell the public to get on the phone with your legislators, to write letters. The government is at fault by getting rid of the process where the board can offer the “last best offer”. (Linda Raises her voice for the following sentence:) Governor, we must being back the “last best offer”. I am sick about this but I have to support it.

Karen Rusin: Shame on th NJEA. This is a horrible contract. The school loses, we will suffer. We didn’t have a choice. This was the cheapest route to get a contract and I can’t afford to vote no. the other route would have cost us another $60,000 in additional mediation, and unknown what would have come out of it.

Jack Sullivan (negotiations)- I agree with all above comments. This is directed at the NJEA not the teachers. Our hands are tied. The NJEA is powerful. This was a choice of the lesser of 2 evils for the teachers. The teachers are still deserving of our support. I wish we could have had better results. The teachers now better surpass our expectations. We must keep the harmony of the district.

Sandro Villaraut- I am disappointed. Some responsibility lies with the teachers to recognize what is happening. We will expect better roles out of them. This was a difficult negotiation and mediation. Some nites the committee was up unitl 2:30 in the morning.

Adele Lewis (president of BOE and part of the negotiations committee)- This was the culmination of 1 years workth of work. We thank jack and the committee. This was a big sacrifice. We do appreciate the teachers of our district and also have to weigh the responsibility to the taxpayers. We did recive some concession in health care. We must now move forward, that is all we can hope for.

Before the vote Cristime Guerriero added 1 final comment-We hope this contract doesn't cause us to lose ground is services for the education of the children.

The vote was 8 for the contract and 1 against. (The 1 dissenting was Member Guerriero.) Almost all the members when they voted yes followed up with comments such as “yes, but reluctantly” or “yes, with apprehension”. Member Rusin actually gave a long pause as in thought as to whether to vote yes or no but then conceded to vote yes.

Post #6-Letter to council on the RVSA appointment

2009-01-05T13:47:00.003-05:00

1/5/09: This letter is to further address the issue I had brought up in the December, 2008 council meeting, a matter which will definitely need the council’s attention sometime in January. The issue refers to the quality of character that is required of the Garwood appointee to the Rahway Valley Sewerage Authority (RVSA). The Garwood representative comes up for appointment soon and needs to be filled come February 1st, 2009. The appointment is for a 5 year term.

The natural sequence would be for the mayor to re-appoint Garwood’s RVSA sitting member, Charles Lombardo, for another 5 year term and look to your approval by council vote. However, a lot has changed from when Charles was appointed 5 years ago. To the mayor: the residents suggest for you to select another candidate to represent GW at the RVSA for reasons explained below. To the council: if the mayor fails in his diligence, then before you deliberate and vote, you consider the below issues.

The candidate: Since his last appointment, Charles Lombardo had, separate from the boro’s activities, been designated by high political party people as the Democrat committee chairman of Garwood. This position is a political one where his priority is to advance and promote the ideals of a political party and to find candidates to fill positions of power in local government. Those of you who are democrat on the council already know this because he is the one who had given the blessing for you to run as a candidate for council. Therefore, you understand his purpose. And as such, he now has a single political party credo as his mantra and that specifically takes priority over general concerns of all the residents. But the concerns of the residents are required when one sits on the RVSA. This biased partisanship is vastly different than if he was, say, “chairman” of the Lions club and appointed to the RVSA. We are all aware of how entities of government in NJ are being pushed and swayed by partisan politics and not social clubs like the lions club. The RVSA should not end up with high level partisan people involved. The RVSA is not about politics, but about the residents’ welfare. Garwood must make sure their representative maintains full integrity toward all the residents when they appoint.

The service: There are 11 members on the RVSA board; each is a representative and was appointed by a town that the RVSA serves. They hail from many walks of life. Looking at RVSA experience on the board, the members range from 23 years experience serving on the board down to 1 year. Although, Charles has 13 years on the board that only places him in the middle of the pack. The board is well represented with experience, and if GW selects a fresh candidate with no experience that would not be any different than the 2 towns that felt comfortable enough to do it the previous year.

The malfeasant act: In the year 2007, the RVSA had introduced an issue that the RVSA should privatize itself. The RVSA had senator Lesniak's law firm put together an initial privatization study. But quickly many member towns, Garwood’s mayor and council included, wrote letters to the RVSA stating unequivocally that this action should not be taken up by the RVSA board at that time. The RVSA was in the middle of large $250 million construction program expanding the facilities capacity. The decision would be premature, since it would take the construction program to be finished in 2 years and then 1 more year of defining the new operational costs before any thought of privatization could be considered. However, contrary to the member towns’ directions, in an RVSA meeting in the third quarter of 2007, certain individuals, including our Charles Lombardo, put forth a vote to start the process toward privatization of the RVSA. This was AGAINST THE WISHES OF OUR GARWOOD MAYOR AND COUNCIL. Don’t let anyone minimalize to you what transacted here. This vote to start the privatization process passed by a 1 vote majority. Charles Lombardo voted for this privatization. If Charles Lombardo listened to the directive of our Mayor and Council it would have been correctly defeated. Member towns were outraged about this act of malfeasance by the RVSA board, some town councils calling their own member in front and chastising him. Certain RVSA members wrote letters to the papers denouncing this “forced” vote. Two towns subsequently removed their members and reappointed new ones when those member’s terms was up. (Also see “The politics” below for the ulterior explanation.) From the immediate vocal backlash of many towns the RVSA board subsequently rescinded the vote the following month. Repercussions are still occurring in member towns over this betrayal of trust.

The GW residents’ voice: That same year when Charles Lombardo committed the malfeasant act, his council seat was up for election. The residents found out about the act and voted him out of office at election time. Out of the 4 candidates, Lombardo, who was a 21 years sitting councilman was the lowest vote getter. The residents obviously were incensed that he did not have the interests of the Garwood residents and firmly stated they did not want him representing them.

The politics: One may ask why would Lombardo act with malfeasance when strict directions to him were given by Garwood? That seems inexplicable. However, his act can be explained by the context of self-serving NJ politics. Senator Lesniak, who is a Democrat state senator from eastern Union County boasted in a Star ledger article 4 years ago that he is the “political boss” of the area and controls the hiring, firing and appointed positions of the towns he controls in the area. He also has a law firm named “Weiner-Lesniak” that does business with many governmental entities almost all which are Democrat controlled. Garwood has been exposed to Lesniak and his law firm, since they represented the development of the MEWs and also the failed applicant for St Anne’s. These developers are donors to Lesniak and his political campaigns. Subsequently, we ended up with a substandard project in the MEWs as the porches were collapsing and existing walls of the town homes, with residents living there already, had to be demolished to correct erroneous construction standards. This is all fact. 5 years ago, when Lombardo became the Democrat political chairman of Garwood he also “coincidentally” got a good job in the Union County government which is also Democrat controlled. In essence, now Lombardo could be counted on for allegiance to Lesniak. This political climate would come into play in the malfeasant act while Lombardo was serving on the RVSA board. In addition, other RVSA members were also easily linked to Lesniak and his control over the towns and the government jobs he hands out. The Cranford’s member’s wife has a state government job. The Rahway rep had 2 local government jobs that paid him $250,000/year. Clark’s rep has a high paying job with the city of Rahway which is Democrat controlled. The security of government jobs along with possible promotion and raises are a good enticement for allegiance, and Lesniak ended up with subtle control over many members of the RVSA. It was from that control, in the late 90’s, the RVSA board had suddenly voted to change the legal firm for the RVSA to Wiener-Lesniak, and these members listed above voted in unison. In the 10 years since installing Lesniak’s law firm billings went from $50,000 per year average to close to $500,000 last year. This is all paid by our tax monies we pay the RVSA. At the end of last year, after seeing the RVSA/ Lesniak legal billings skyrocket, certain factions of the board introduced for vote a choice of two other legal firms to replace Lesniak. Unfortunately, the vote went to retain Weiner-Lesniak with Lombardo still voting for Lesniak. If the vote to privatize the RVSA went thru, Lesniak’s law firm would have made hundred’s of thousands of dollars more of tax payer money for studies, commissions, reports. Most I feel would be frivolous. One example was a report found to be a cut and paste job by Lesniak’s law firm, with minimal work; and then they charged the RVSA $40,000.

The conflicts: As I noted in the December council meeting, there is an unpleasant situation whereas many of you are democrat and Charles Lombardo is the democrat chairman over you. Lombardo would have had to agree to you for you to be a candidate for council. I am not saying that any of you may be tainted, it is just that there are good democrats who believe in the interests of the residents and then there are those democrats compromised by NJ politics for other agendas possibly such as jobs, work, power and money. On all levels of NJ government these people are intermingled. You must all deliberate with care as to how you will vote or even if you should vote. If you do vote please note that Charles Lombardo, as noted above in the first count, has sworn to be totally partisan, and this I feel is a conflict in as such he does not represent the residents anymore but now represents a political party.

In deliberating, 1 or 2 counts may be arguable and also since charges have not been brought this is all legal. But taken together, there unfolds a pattern of abuse and unethical behavior all at the expense of the hard working families and taxpayers, Garwood included. This abuse completely disallows Charles Lombardo to be considered by you, Mayor McCarthy for the appointment and or an emphatic vote no by the council if his name is voted on. You are the stewards of public trust for the people of Garwood; the people unequivocally do not want Charles Lombardo to handle our interests since they voted him out of office. You are to finish what the people started and vote him from any further public control of the RVSA. He has chosen the partisan path, which is fine, but does not represent the people anymore.

Also keep in mind, a most grievous fact is, that if Charles Lombardo is reappointed by you, in 2009 he will most likely end up as the chairman of the RVSA since he is presently the vice-chair. How could you as the mayor and council in good conscience place a person in a position of power that in my opinion betrayed public trust and committed a malfeasant act against the residents, along with dealing self interests with Lesniak, the “political boss” of the area?

Other possible candidates can be considered. The 2 retiring councilmen, Walt Tucker or Bill Schadewald may be worthy. Or councilman Napolitano may be interested. Or if you can’t find someone, I may be your choice. Plus I was involved in the estimating and construction of 4 local waste treatment plants in the 70’s, RVSA was one of them.

In closing, this letter will also be let out in the public domain since it is a major issue for Garwood. There will be certain people with ulterior agendas of NJ politics that will have access to it and read it. If any of you are subjected to intimidation or subtle coercion to vote against your conscience, I request that you please notify me immediately. I have seen this already happen in Garwood and will act on it with diligence in protecting the public’s interest. I appreciate your time and attention toward the interests of all the residents.

(draft) Pros and cons of a new Ladder Fire Truck

2008-11-30T14:35:00.000-05:00

draft.....................................in developement

mutual aid
size of other trucks
fit in fire house
tax impact
builders assessment fee
MEWs height concerns
Aoelian
vicinity of house to street
telephone wires interference
heavy ladder
Chiefs report
insiders at the FD
bucket truck

Post #5- You can't handle the truth

2008-11-30T14:28:00.003-05:00

11/30/08: In the council meeting of late November, a gentleman from 700 block Center street approached the council in the public speaking portion of the meeting. He spoke of a recent incident where his wife had a heart attack at home and he called 911 for an ambulance. You could sense he was somewhat irate. He called 911 and let it ring many times but no one answered. He hung up and then called again, this time someone answered.

He asked the mayor where the call goes. The mayor responded with the procedure that it goes to our police dispatch first. When the dispatcher receives the call they send over a police cruiser as first responder to the home to assess the medical situation. It was from that assessment that a call would go to the ambulance squad for their medical expertise and emergency services. He did not give a reason why the phone wasn't answered, and the police chief want in attendance that night.

The resident went on to say that there was no problem in procedure and first he would like to say that the services were excellent, that the ambulance took his wife to overlook where she was recuperating and doing well. She is home now.

However, what he found fault with was that the ambulance was a independent ambulance company from Neptune, NJ, although he said it may actually be based nearby since they showed up in a timely fashion. He wanted to know why our own ambulance squad did not show up but a Neptune, NJ Squad Company.

At this point the boro attorney joined the discussion that there are different levels of medical attention and that based on the medical situation assessment (that being a possible heart attack in this situation) a better equiped ambulance service with appropriate life support equipment would be needed, and that call was made. Thus the ambulance company from Neptune, NJ showed.

This gentleman said he now understood to a degree, but took exception that our own first aid squad didn’t arrive, (and he was still irate.) He then said that two weeks later he received a bill from the Neptune ambulance squad and he held it up and said “take a guess, how much it is?” Numbers from the public were $600, 1200, $1600. He said no, you are all wrong and said the bill is for $2,300 for the transport to overlook hospital. There were gasps. He then said that although he was happy that everything worked out well with his wife for those 2 weeks, it sure took the wind out of his sails when he got the bill. The administration then said if you’re insured you can submit it, but he countered what if you’re not insured it’s a big surprise out of the blue and that wasn't the problem here.

It was at this point the boro attorney with the mayor in agreement said the statement that derives the title of this blog: “We don’t want to have anyone avoid making the call based what it may cost.”

As well intentioned as this may have sounded it also exposes a most grievous problem with those in our government. They think that we as the public can not make any decisions for ourselves, which obviously makes them think of themselves as better than the common residents. In essence, this is pure arrogance! Here-in lies the problem. We don’t need daddy mayor, daddy boro attorney nor mommy government to make every decision for us. Yes, we look toward to the government for important services such as in the medical emergency above. But who is to say they know better in offering any other services that we should be kept in the dark until after it’s over and the surprises come out of the woodwork. We are all adults and can make adult decisions and the decision would be the correct one; after all I believe the United States is founded on giving rights to its citizenry to choose. At the very least an informed public is an intelligent public and holding back information just isolates us more and more from the decision making process. Thus it creates a mindset that just may make wrong decisions based on partial or no information in varied situations. Transparency is always paramount.

In the end, the resident said that the mayor and council should make the seniors aware of this major cost surprise, but the looks from the administration was passiveness. A resident then suggested that either detail the procedure of the 911 and medical assessment in the boro’s “Just the Facts” newsletter or have the GW First Aid Squad send a flyer out explaining the procedure. Information regarding the public should always be given to the public.

In the very end, to defuse the council situation with some levity, the resident said that a week after all this he got a donation letter from GW First Aid Squad asking for a donation. He said he will still donate because they are a good cause.

(draft) upcoming tax impacts

2008-11-30T13:39:00.001-05:00

draft: ...................................................in developement

BOE-send recv, new teach contr, end of deregional distr, recoup some spec ed lawsuit rev monies from region, MEWs rev

Muni/Boro-RVSA, pension payback, MEWs rev, contr incr, tax loss, assumption loss, bailout offset gone for now

County-loss on deed and prop regist, devalue home values versus incr tax rate, cert 5% contract incr, pension paybacks

rough guess at this time dec 08 cnty = $100-150 (4/2/09 closer to $110 4/2/09-one shot deals and gimmicks involved), BOE= $200-300 (4/2/09 closer to $135-one shot deals involved)muni=$450-600 (4/2/09 $170-gimmicks involved)

guess total about $850-900 average tax impact (4/2/09 total is $415/ avg per 100k assessment. This is good for the bad times, but bubble gum and scotch tape gimmicks and 1 shot deals only last so long)

(draft) the acceptable flaw

2008-11-28T16:09:00.000-05:00

draft................the legal "by' date

(draft) what we should learn from the MEWs redevelopement

2008-11-27T11:14:00.000-05:00

draft...... in developement

One thing that is a constant is developers and politics are blood brothers, but the blood normally spilled are that of the taxpyaers and residents around the project developements. From the eminent domain fiasco down in Long Branch to the developer Kushner (who was the major McGreevy fundraiser) debacle and incarceration, there are major problems and smaller problems but as always money and the abuse of residents are involved somehow.

pollution remediation
4 months in PB no compromise
density problem
height problem
egress problem
sprinkler
R1 vs R5
town home porches
rental facade and porch
interfact between constr dept in cranford
PB engr in GW
confl of interest PB engr works appears to work for developer interestelsewhere
change order log
lesniak
kit of parts
store fronts on north ave
turning lanes disappear
street name
under 55

Post #4- a response to Cnclwmn Villaggio's public statement

2008-11-26T19:25:00.002-05:00

11/26/08: The following will be my response to councilwoman Villaggio’s statement she read during the 9/9/08 council meeting. you can find her statement on page 9 of this link to the council agenda minutes: http://garwood.org/docs/minutes/2008/09-09-08.doc

Some background first- This is in reference to an issue that came up during the summer whereby a bipartisan non-binding resolution was put forth to the council by GOP cnclmn Sytko and Dem cnclmn Napolitano stating that there should be fair district type representation for Union County freeholder elections instead of all "at large" freeholder type, whereby the largest city in the county with its insurmountable vote count can control the freeholder board. Over the 2 summer months this issue was discussed publicly in council meetings; I had written 2 open letters to the residents, mayor and council stating that if this resolution is voted down, it would reflect that the GW council is not attentive to the residents, there is bad politics involved and that it may be time to change the complexity of the council make up (through the voting process). Councilwoman Villaggio subsequently wrote her own statement and read it into the council record. By this blog my response to her statement is as follows:

But first, I unabashedly would like to thank KV and even agree with KV that we are all allowed to express our opinions thanks to the freedoms granted under our democracy. She notes that she has listened to many of my ideas and has introduced some of my ideas into the boro public meetings and processes. She does exhibit reasonable discretion and is objective to all ideas. I will save any additional compliments for her till the end since this is regarding the public statement she read. Forensics as follows-

A) Her fabrications:
1) In paragraph 3 and 10 she wants to make it look like I do not like any democrats. This is of course wrong but is her way of trying to turn a whole political party against me. She cannot prove anywhere where I have made such statements or actions to that effect. I vote for democrats and even recommend to others certain good democrat candidates to vote for. I have even told her on past occasions that I had at that time explained to voters that KV is a reasonable candidate to consider, but she forgets that. I have also stated publicly that it is not a "democrat versus republican" thing but a "people versus bad government" thing. But with her statement she wants to make it the Dems versus GOP and wants to force people to pick sides based on their political affiliation. It turns out that she is the partisan one. Even proclaims it in paragraph 3 that she and her family have always been lifleong democrats, which makes one wonder if she considers candidates on merit or is just a line voter without any thought when she goes into the voting booth. This is simply irresponsible. This claim of KV is pure manipulation from her. (Plus, she forgets that I am an independent). In addition, I have stated many times that the problem is the "false democrats” that have hijacked the democrat line and self serve themselves, their relatives, cronies, political bosses and political donors, instead of putting hard working residents and families first. Any democrats who do express concern and care for the citizens I gladly advocate and even vote for. As an activist and concerned resident I must expose them as “false ones" and hope to expel them from having any access of power.
2) She states I said that GW sends over $4 mill in tax moneys to the county and she corrects that figure as $2.2 mill. If she read my first letter, that $2.2 mill is exactly the figure I have stated. The other $1.7 million I note in my letter is the portion of county indirect dollars that can be apportioned to GW by way of county grants, fees, allocations, revenues. She's on the GW budget committee and should have understood this concept. It appears if she can't find something wrong with my statements she has to make something up.
3) Having failed at manipulating the entire democrat party against me, she then in paragraph 10 brings up her gender and that she is the lone woman on council. She queries that if I want to change the complexity of council it must be that I want to get rid of the lone woman. Unfortunately, this is another sad attempt, this time to manipulate the entire female population against me. Let me reiterate KV: it’s the people versus bad government, not democrats, not women but bad government.

B) Rhetorical defense: In paragraph 8 she asks me "do I know what we presently get in direct and indirect county services?" This is exactly what I have been asking the council which includes Ms Villaggio for the past 4 years. I have been asking the council including Ms Villaggio to please create a commission to study if we get back our fair share of monies and services from the county. Like I noted right above there is $4 mill of county monies attributable to GW by way of taxes and other revenues. Summit and Cranford are doing studies and indicators show about 10 to 20 cents on the dollar in county services returned. This is completely unacceptable. If this is the trend regarding what the county does to the central towns in the county then surely we don't get even close to the $4 mill in services? Maybe its only $800,000 to $1 mill, and this is unfair. But with no study we have no idea. This was the actual underlying impetus of the non-binding resolution that she vehemently opposes. Her vote of No is surely disturbing to the wishes of the boro residents. Summit, Cranford, Kenilworth and Roselle so far has supported this resolution. Garwood's resolution which KV voted NO on failed to support it.

C) Her challenge, my answer, her inaction: In paragraph 9 she took me to task regarding my statement on the poor MEWs construction and wanted me to list just what is wrong with it, although in my first letter I actually noted some items, she must have forgot that. So in the following 2 months i then made additional public statements on items while she is sitting on the Planning board and council: that the MEWs town-homes were built wrong using an R1 rating versus an R5 rating. Major rehab has to be done, possibly punching holes in the owner’s existing walls for remedy. I also reiterated that the naming of the streets in and around the MEWs creates major liability to the town during emergencies and crisis, the problem being there are now 3 roads with the name Maple in it and 3 roads with Chestnut. She is now fully aware of what I meant yet is silent on it. Why isn’t she personally following up with an investigation to a conclusion and resolution? Like I noted previously, the MEW’s developer donated $100,000 to cnclwmn Villaggio's political party and her own regional political boss Lesniak’s campaign funds. She challenged me and i gave her something alarming to address and then she just ignores the problems. Whose backside is she protecting?

D) In paragraph 3 she notes about her long tenure at the county and uses that as if she is above the county politics. But since the “false county democrats” took over and corrupted the county system back in 1998 she joined right in lock step with them. Per the ELEC website, since 2000 when she had become councilwoman, she has donated thousands of dollars to the county democrat political party in control of county government. Plus did she forget that she tried to circumvent the county hiring process by going directly to her county political boss to get a crony a job at the county. And I won’t go into her fast rising salary, retroactive/ yearly bonuses and promotions she gets from the county after she became a sitting councilwoman. She says it was her own idea to run for council. But at the same time, the Star Ledger had an article about her county democrat political boss, (who is now under many subpoenas, being investigated and had to step down from being the county boss), describing this boss as the one to “hand pick” all democrat candidates in the county. In fact this county poltical boss has a county job along with KV down at the county. Words say one thing but her actions reveal something else a little too cozy and wrong.

E) It becomes obvious the residents agree with the bipartisan proclamation but that KV in contradiction had voted NO on. The proof is in the past freeholder elections. Just going back a sample of 5 years comprising of 16 Union County freeholder elections, us GW voters picked the opponents against the incumbant democrat county freeholders in 14 of those elections. Just this year it was even by the widest margin yet. And last year the GW voters proved their disdain toward bad politics and the county and threw out a 21 year veteran councilman because of the baggage he has with the county, the regional political boss and also because of his RVSA vote counter to the wishes of the mayor, council and residents. We, as GW residents don't want this to happen again, but it may look like deja vu.

Councilwoman Villagio, I have said on many occasions you are intelligent and can be proactive toward the public and I still think so, but then I have also told you that I have problems with you. Unfortunately the baggage you bring from the bad county system makes you too connected and suspect. It raises serious questions if you can truly put the residents first, before the county, in any major governmental action. Your NO vote on the fair representation resolution was one indicator, since you really didn’t give a convincing argument that your vote NO was advantageous to the GW residents. Instead in your public statement you tried to incite by fabrication all the democrats and women against me. Is that a worthy action of a sitting councilperson?

What the residents want are council people who bring with them an unquestionable allegiance that the boro comes first, actions that distant oneself from bad politics, political bosses and bad politicians, not work with, embrace and financially support such. The residents want a council person who can advocate and push hard for GW to the county freeholders for additional fair services without that council person having to mull in the back of their head that they may be jeopardizing their county job or yearly raise. If you had no baggage, no jeopardy, no questions, no county job, I would advocate you solidly as a member of the council. But you won’t or you can’t. At your statement's end you say you may or may not run again next year and unequivocally state that the decision will not be made because of Bruce. That is good, because that decision must be made because of yourself. I’m just a messenger.

Post #3- Envision a bag of $$ flying out the window

2008-11-25T21:16:00.002-05:00

11/25/08: Council meeting: one has to wonder how much energies the council puts into financial cost savings, this time regarding health insurance. On the one hand they have to be commended for at least coming up with a savings idea, which took a direction similar to other governmental entities, but still it is a savings. But it appears they drift away from full diligence. At this council meeting, the council discussed and voted on the concept of: if a boro worker has a spouse that carries health insurance for the family, then the boro worker can "opt out of" (decline) the boro health insurance program and get a reward back at the end of each year. It was suggested by cnclwmn KV that this award amount be $6,000 to be paid to the employee by the boro (ie-with taxpayer money). Since the health insurance costing the boro could be up to $12,800 per employee, she stated that would be a savings to the boro of at least 50% or $6,800. Commendable until one starts to inquire. The $6,000 figure was arrived at by looking at a neighboring town. That town, per KV, gives an award of $7,000. However, why can't we look right in our own neighborhood. Right here in our own boro the school board just last month voted on giving the school employees a $4,000 award for "opting out". KV knows that because she attended that BOE meeting when they voted on it. In addition, even Union County, that bastion of profligate spending, only gives a $5,000 award. The council responses then came out: "we don't know what kind of health insurance the teachers or the county has". (This is odd because KV actually works for the county). Plus "it might be only 1 person that opts out, we don't know".

So this brought up more questions: 1) Wouldn't you at least check out the school district's health insurance plan, especially when you are aware they just voted on a $4,000 award? (To us, it seems the school teachers would probably have a better health plan anyway since they have union bargaining on their side.) 2) Wouldnt it help in weighing advantages and disadvantages if an informal poll was taken to see who may "opt out"? 3) and why would the council base awards on some "neighboring town". That town isn't going thru dire financial straits like GW and getting bailed out by the state with extroadinary aid relief at $250,000 in the last 4 years out of 5.

As KV previously noted, this 2008 year was probably the worst budgeting cycle ever for the boro (so far) where they had to slash and cut and even rely on assumptions of future tax recovery to get to a more palatable boro tax impact this year. With this painful task just under the belt a few months ago, one would hope they scrutinize any and all further financial matters a little more in depth to maximize savings for the taxpayers. When one takes the oath of office, council fiduciary responsibilities should not end up only when a budget crisis arises in March; and then half heartedly work on items thru the rest of the year. That's what creates the budget crisis in the first place and then it may be too late.

After the public suggested they either return this back into committee discussion or at least amend the award to only $4,000, similar to our own BOE, the council voted anyway to make it $6,000. The vote was unanimous.

Now can you picture that $$ bag with the wings? This lapse does not bode well for GW's financial future and next years budget cycle.

Dare we say that, on this item, Union county government actually did a better job?

Post #2- does the planning board have a revolving door?

2008-11-24T14:45:00.002-05:00

11/24/08: It will be interesting to see who will be appointed by the mayor to fill the upcoming January vacancy on the planning board, now that Lou P has been elected to the council. Three years in a row, the mayor and the political boss of the GW democrats picked a planning board member to run for council. We find nothing basically wrong in each of those chosen (they're all swell guys)except for the length of time they really served on the PB, which subsequently was listed on their candidacy literature. The big problem is the PB seats appear to now be a revolving door to political ends.

The past 3 years summed up: 2 openings were created when 2 PB members, each who sat for only 1 year on the board, were then tapped to run for council. Lou P at least sat for 2 years on the PB before being tapped as a council candidate, but what can one contribute to the PB process with 2 years or less tenure? The big picture here is we are facing a total makeover of the GW master plan which may allow major developements to take place in GW (which we have already seen from the MEWs, MEWs jr. and St. Anne's). We believe that the energies of the PB and its members should be wholly directed toward addressing the future of GW, not specifically created to be a short term bull pen for political purposes. With the last 3 out of 4 planning board appointees now "coincidentally" sitting on the council, it suspiciously appears that the PB appointment process is allegedly being subtly subverted toward political purposes. And this unfortunately is happening right at the same time major developers who donate big politically, and the regional political boss Lesniak's law firm has been making inroads into GW's buildout. Vigilance and due diligence should be the product from the PB not future politicans.

This abuse of the PB appointment system by DM, the mayor, and CL, the local dem political boss of GW, does not bode well toward GW's future. Our guess for this january's PB appointee will at least not be someone running for council this upcoming year, since council people KS and KV who are up for election most probably will run again for their seats.

If this alleged subversion continues, will someone be appointed to the PB this year just to be groomed by the democrats for the following year, similar to the recent past? After all there is one republican on the council and he will up for election that year. To be continued in January, 2009!

(other potential blogs considered as "the rest of story" in conjunction with this blog will be on the construction problems at the MEWs, the political donor/developers, future council candidates)

11/08 inception MISSION STATEMENT

2008-11-24T14:17:00.002-05:00

Post #1 dated 11/24/08: Garwood can be broken down into 3 major dynamics. Each should be reported on. The government has their newsletter "Just the Facts"; the school board has their missive, "The Garwood Connection". Hopefully that makes the TREE blog a de facto voice of the people. The other 2 are dry with facts and figures. What the others don’t cover, the TREE will try to explain or expose, covering public response and concerns and what the public is saying at various meetings. Or it may just note the opinion of the residents sitting on the “stoop”. What will be fun is not only expressing the facts but interpreting them in depth also for the residents, based on our over 10 years experience following the actions of the boro agencies and the 5+ years of publishing the local TREE newsletter (now in hibernation). There is so much “under the surface” stuff that creates decisions, directions and opinions in our boro. And the casual observer may not be privy to such since we all live busy, busy lives. But one thing to remember: The residents of this great boro come first! In NJ it seems to always boils down to the people versus bad government on all levels. After this inital post we will start the blog and anyone will be welcome to speak his or her mind in the TREE blog by way of the comment section. But one can only give so much credence to posting if they come from someone anonymous. We will always honor and admire those who post under their own name and stand up for their conviction of issue. The TREEeditor will be the deciding factor in allowing posts to remain if they become too offensive to the readers. That’s not to say we will remove those critical of the TREE. Being higher profile will always beget such. Who knows if this will get legs! its all based on my (and our) energy and attentiveness. Good luck to all.

Garwood's *INDEPENDENT* T.R.E.E (The Roaming Eye & Ear)