Pine Barrens Tribune July 17, 2021-July 23, 2021

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Rare Tornado Targets LEHT Neighborhood, Just 5 Minutes Prior to Cellphone Warning

BACK FROM THE BRINK

Trees Uprooted, Property Damaged

by Early-Morning ‘Spinoff’ of Elsa

By Bill Bonvie Staff Writer

Photo Provided

Bass River resident and former Pinelands Regional school board member Thomas D. “Tommy” Williams (right), Jr., pictured with his wife, Maggie.

When Thomas D. Williams, Jr. Resigned from the Pinelands Regional School Board Citing Health Issues, He Didn’t Disclose that COVID-19 Had Ravaged His Good Lung — Or That He Was One of the First Pandemic Patients to Get a Lifesaving Transplant

By Bill Bonvie Staff Writer

BASS RIVER—Back in the beginning of June, when Thomas D. “Tommy” Williams, Jr. announced his resignation as Bass River Township’s representative to the Pinelands Regional Board of Education after two decades of dedicated service on the board, and following a 10-week stint as its president, his only explanation for leaving so unexpectedly

was that “some minor health things” had “turned into major ones,” rendering him “unable to perform the duties I was elected to do.”

That, however, turned out to have been quite an understatement.

W hat wa s re a l ly goi ng on w ith Williams, a 33-year law-enforcement veteran and retired lieutenant with the Little Egg Harbor Police Department, was a major medical drama that, while not divulged to most of the people who knew

him as a member of the frequently divided school board, had already been shared with Philadelphians who were totally unacquainted with him – his predicament having ended up being featured on a news broadcast by the ABC affiliate in Philadelphia, Channel 6 (WPVI-TV).

The 60-year-old Williams, despite being an avid outdoorsman, was already suffering health problems that were largely See TRANSPLANT/ Page 6

LITTLE EGG HARBOR—At 3:38 a.m. on Friday, July 9, a shrill ring tone went out over cellphones of people living in extreme southern Ocean and Burlington counties that turned out to be a warning of an imminent tornado spawned by the remnants of Tropical Storm Elsa, and advising them to seek shelter, based on lower-atmosphere wind rotation observed on the National Weather Services’ Doppler radar.

At 3:56 a.m., however, the warning had been cancelled by the National Weather Service as the storm was no longer deemed capable of spawning a tornado in the area.

For residents living along a portion of Sycamore Drive in Little Egg Harbor Township, however, the warning, when it came, was something of an afterthought, because, as it turned out, they had just experienced a tornado five minutes before – although that would not be officially confirmed until much later on in the day.

The distinctly unwelcome and rather unusual early-morning meteorological visitor to their attractive and leafy street was one that uprooted and snapped large trees in half, which in turn took down a chimney and destroyed part of a deck and stockade fence, as well as smashing a parked car – although, fortunately, there were no apparent reports of injuries.

“It was a weird sound, scary as hell,” said Patricia Bonansinga of the noise that woke her up sometime around 3:30 a.m. “You know thunder and lightning, you know See TORNADO/ Page 10

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Medford Looks to Ease Off-Street Parking Requirements for Businesses in Downtown District of Medford Village

Storefront in the Village of Medford.

By Douglas D. Melegari Staff Writer

MEDFORD — Officials in Medford Township are giving serious consideration to relaxing a land development ordinance that currently requires off-street parking for every new use in the Village of Medford (with the number of required spaces dependent on the use’s industry), in hopes that in doing so it will both attract new businesses and “bring in new uses” to the township’s downtown district.

Essentially, every business in the village, according to officials, currently has to provide for off-street parking, unless they receive a variance through the township Zoning Board. Mayor Charles “Chuck” Watson pointed out that a brewery in the village has no off-street parking as part of its site, and therefore had to obtain a variance in order to open and be compliant with the law.

“I f we had en forc e d the park i ng requirements on them, we wouldn’t have been able to have a brewery there,” said Watson during a recent Medford Council meeting. “… Making people jump through hoops by going through the variance process for parking just seems to be overly burdensome when our downtown is now thriving.”

Watson pointed out that the township has held Food Truck Nights without requiring the vendors to provide for off-street parking and there have been no resulting parking problems. He added that the recent opening of the new Medford Town Hall has also added 100 available off-street parking spots to the village.

While most of the councilmembers expressed that they want to relax the current off-street parking requirements, there had been some disagreement amongst the council about how far to ease them.

Councilman Bradley Denn recently expressed that he felt the requirements should be done away with entirely for all businesses in the village, while Watson recently asserted that he felt they should only be eased for eating establishments, and possibly for breweries or retail stores, or other types of businesses where patrons come and go throughout the day.

“If it is a restaurant, for instance, you have people coming and going,” Watson contended. “But if you are a group of offices, and you have however many people who are in that office, they will come and park there all day and won’t free up any parking spots until they go home.”

Denn, however, pointed out that most existing office buildings in the village, particularly on Main Street, already “have

Photo By Jake Wasiak

parking.” He provided the hypothetical example that if an insurance business downtown is sold to an accountant, “it is not going to get rid of the parking spaces.”

It has been a consideration by council to ease the off-street parking requirements to the point where a new use would only have to provide for 50 percent of the parking spaces outlined in the current ordinance on the books.

“What if someone buys a building that doesn’t have parking and decides to put offices in it, and only puts in half of what they need and someone parks all day long?” asked Watson in response.

Denn then declared that he does not think the council should be “legislating things like this.”

Councilman Frank Czekay, however, contended that the easing of restrictions “needs to be limited” and mainly for “businesses that have turnover,” with some exceptions, such as medical offices because they may have turnover, but still large amounts of staff who “park there all day long.”

“So, they have to be carved out of this,” Czekay said. “It has to be pure retail, restaurants and stores. That would make the most sense.”

Township Solicitor Timothy Prime agreed with Czekay that a medical office should have to provide for the full off-street parking because of the volume of traffic such facilities generate. He pointed out that an “office to office” transaction would not be considered a change in use, but converting an office space to a restaurant or retail shop “would trigger a site plan review.”

Under the current land use ordinance, according to Prime, one off-street parking space has to be provided by retail and service activities businesses for every 200 square feet of building space, while restaurants and taverns have to provide one off-street parking space for every three seats.

“So, it is a pretty vigorous standard for restaurants and taverns,” Prime contended.

At one point, Prime, who noted that council originally had discussed relaxing the requirements to where “any new use had to provide only at least 70 percent of the parking required by the (current) ordinance,” contended he felt “it didn’t help enough,” and that is why he put 50 percent in the draft ordinance that was before council, and asked the public body if it felt that percentage was fair.

Watson, in reply, said a business could always seek a variance if that percentage See DOWNTOWN/ Page 12

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Discussions Over Future of Woodland Fire and EMS to ‘Continue,’ with Town Officials Giving Assurances that Emergency Services Would Not Be Interrupted

By Douglas D. Melegari Staff Writer

WOODLAND—After spending about an hour and 20 minutes in a remote executive session last Friday morning, July 9, the Woodland Township Committee reconvened a special meeting via telephone that it had called to order at 10 a.m. that day with its solicitor, William Burns, remarking to the public that “the committee and the Woodland Township Volunteer Fire and First Aid Squad are in discussions to provide the very best of emergency services to the town, and those discussions about how that service will be provided will continue; and about how that service will be improved will continue.”

Among the reasons cited by Burns for the committee needing to enter closed session was to “discuss matters involving the purchase, lease or acquisition of real property with public funds, or an investment of public funds.”

But no action was taken by the governing body on that day, nor was a timeline put forth, with one resident, Terry Sheerin, remarking during the special meeting’s public comment portion that she hopes a “time and end date” will be set “to get these firefighters back in action and … back to what they do so well.”

Just a few days earlier, Burns, who is also the township’s public information officer, told the Pine Barrens Tribune that it was his “understanding” that “all” the members of the Woodland Volunteer Fire and EMS Company, including Chief Shawn Viscardi, resigned from their posts with the company sometime over the Fourth of July holiday weekend, while Nancy Valentino, an

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Saturday, July 17, 2021

attorney representing the emergency agency, said that a “majority or all” of the members resigned, including the chief.

Both attorneys, however, were unable to tell this newspaper at the time just how many members resigned. This newspaper learned on July 13 through an Open Public Records Act (OPRA) request that three members in total, including Viscardi, had submitted written resignations to the township on July 4.

Viscardi stated in October 2019 that “five to six actual members are left of local volunteers.”

The remarks from Burns and Valentino had followed a Nixle alert message sent to township residents July 5 informing them that, “Due to extenuating circumstances, Tabernacle Fire & EMS will be covering Woodland Township temporarily. If you have an emergency, please continue to follow normal procedure and dial 911.”

But there was no reference to any of the purported resignations during the special meeting, and Viscardi, instead, replied “here” at the session when Woodland Township Administrator and Clerk Maryalice Brown read his name as part of a roll call of local officials. Viscardi also apparently partook in the executive session, and, in returning to the remote public meeting, announced himself as “Woodland Fire.”

“Rest assured that Woodland Township will be ser ved and there will be fire suppression, rescue and emergency medical services provided,” Burns declared. “Simply, if any resident calls 911, fire (personnel) or/ and EMTs will show up to your emergency.

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See EMERGENCY/ Page 11

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Cannabis Businesses Prohibited for Now in Medford, at Least Until State Regulations, First Licenses Issued

By Douglas D. Melegari Staff Writer

MEDFORD—All classes of licensed cannabis businesses have been prohibited in Medford Township (the exception being a delivery service, which a municipality cannot ban under state law), in a 5-0 decision of Medford Township Council, at least until the state’s newly-created Cannabis Regulatory Commission issues its first regulations and licenses.

The state regulations are supposed to be prepared by an Aug. 21 deadline, according to Township Solicitor Timothy Prime, and the first licenses are expected to be issued early next year.

Prime, however, at a recent meeting of Medford Township Council, explained that council faced a “Hobson’s choice,” or a choice of taking what is available or nothing at all, in arriving at its decision last month.

That is because municipalities must decide by Aug. 21 whether they will allow or disallow cannabis businesses within their borders, but the commission, charged with regulating cannabis industries in the state “has just met for the first time, and has to hire staff to prepare regulations and then implement them,” according to Prime, making the state regulations that would serve as a basis for any local provisions unavailable by the deadline for municipalities (municipal ordinances have to be passed over a several week period allowing for a first and second reading).

“Without regulations, the township would be forced to try to develop their own regulations that may or may not be consistent with the state regulations once they are adopted,” said Prime of the issues posed by the dual deadline. “In addition,

the municipal land use law provides that any conditional use, such as the retail sale of cannabis, has to have conditions attached and there are none in the statute. Again, the municipality would have to develop their own conditional use standards, which may or may not be consistent with the ultimate state regulations.”

The state statute pertaining to cannabis, enacted in February, “provides that unless the municipality bans all commercial cannabis uses by Aug. 21, any of the cannabis com mercial uses, including cultivation, distribution, warehousing, etc. are automatically permitted in any industrial or similar zone in the municipality,” Prime noted.

Due to what Prime called a “sunset provision” in the state statute, municipalities can “opt-in” at any time after the Aug. 21 deadline, but cannot “opt-out” after that time for five years, or in other words, if cannabis businesses are permitted through inaction, a municipality would have to wait at least five years before it could prohibit them, and those established during that waiting period are then grandfathered.

“My recommendation to you is to ban it for now to meet the deadline, and adopt an ordinance that bans it, and see how it goes, and then either you or future councils can decide (if you want to opt-in),” Prime recently told council. “… There is a lot we don’t know at this point. It is a new industry (in New Jersey), and I do not think we are, and I certainly am not, in a position to recommend it to you or guide you through it (the process) very well. We just don’t know what the recommendations are on it yet.”

See CANNABIS/ Page 12

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‘Roll-Off Dumpster’ Redefined by Medford Council After Man Says Permit Requirement Doesn’t Apply to Him Because He Has Mulch in One, Not Garbage

By Douglas D. Melegari Staff Writer

MEDFORD—The definition of a “rolloff dumpster” in Medford Township’s code book has been formally redefined by Medford Township Council on July 6 after a resident challenged his being subjected to a local law that prohibits roll-off dumpsters from being parked in the public right-of-way unless a permit is secured.

The resident, according to Township Manager Kathy Burger, had mulch in a roll-off dumpster parked in a public rightof-way, but the township definition of a rolloff dumpster was, up until the recent action, “a large container designed and used for the temporary storage of refuse, rubbish, trash, garbage, junk, debris, offal, or any material rejected as useless and fit only to be thrown away.”

According to a statement released by Medford Township, the mulch was for “spreading on his landscaping.” The statement added that when Zoning Officer Beth Portocalis “issued the resident a letter advising that a permit was required and that failure to obtain the permit would result in a notice of violation being issued,” the resident “was not pleased” and responded the roll-off dumpster “contained mulch and did not meet the definition of the ordinance.”

“There was a roll-off dumpster, but it wasn’t used for trash, and the way our ordinance is worded, it really wasn’t a trash dumpster,” said Mayor Charles “Chuck” Watson when the revised definition was introduced during a June 15 council meeting.

“The intent (of the law) was to not allow the parking of roll-off containers on our streets

without having our approval.”

The statement released by the township emphasized that the original intent of the ordinance was to regulate the placement of containers “regardless of the contents.”

“The Solicitor’s Office reviewed the resident’s letter and it is clear that the definition of ‘a roll-off dumpster’ was too narrow and did not cover containers with mater ial other than trash,” the statement continued. “The Solicitor’s Office recommended an amendment to the ordinance to broaden the definition to cover any roll-off dumpster type container, as the temporary parking of any type of dumpster or container, regardless of its contents, within the right-of-way, is a concern for the public health, safety and welfare.”

Watson noted that it was “never thought people would be using dumpsters for other than trash,” but “if you brought other things in it, you could make an argument that we didn’t have that covered.”

Council also recently passed two bond ordinances, with one of them appropriating $4,717,767 and authorizing the issuance of $4,406,879 in general improvement notes.

“This is our capital budget,” Watson said.

“It includes $2 million in road repairs, two new police vehicles, some equipment, DPW garage improvements, another brush truck and (installing) two turf fields.”

Another statement issued by the township noted that the capital plan also consists of camera system replacements at the municipal firehouses and EMS buildings, PPE gear replacement, emergency twoSee DUMPSTER/ Page 12

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Pemboro Council Proposes to Ban Cannabis Businesses, Contending ‘Insufficient Time’ Has Been Given to Them Governing Body Hopes to Revisit Matter in a Few Months; Many Complaints Aired at First In-Person Meeting of Year

By Douglas D. Melegari Staff Writer

PEMBERTON BOROUGH—An ordinance prohibiting the operation of any class of cannabis businesses within the Borough of Pemberton (the exception being a delivery service, which a municipality cannot ban under state law) has been introduced 4-1 by Pemberton Borough Council, due to a “really insufficient amount of time” for the borough to review forthcoming regulations from the state’s newly-created Cannabis Regulatory Commission ahead of an August deadline.

The commission has until Aug. 21 to release state regulations pertaining to com mercial cannabis industr ies, but municipalities also have until that day to decide whether to allow such operations within their jurisdiction.

Municipalities statewide are therefore faced with a conundrum of sorts, as adopting any ordinance allowing for cannabis businesses is essentially dependent on the commission regulations or could otherwise contain provisions that are ultimately not in accordance with the state regulations, forcing a costly do-over.

According to the New Jersey League of Municipalities, if a municipality does not take any action by Aug. 21, any class of cannabis establishment or distributor will be permitted to operate in that jurisdiction, and depending on the type of establishment, be considered a permitted use in certain zones.

And a municipality that fails to enact an ordinance prohibiting the operation of one or more classes of cannabis establishments, before Aug. 21, is precluded from passing an

ordinance banning them for a period of five years, according to the league, and “after the five-year period,” a municipality has “another 180-day window” to prohibit or limit cannabis operations, but “this action only applies prospectively.”

Municipalities that initially “opt-out,” however, can “opt-in” at any time, the league notes.

“The consensus of council is to investigate marijuana, but the amount of time we have to do it is really insufficient,” said Borough Solicitor David Serlin during a June 21 council meeting. “If we adopt an ordinance to prohibit it, we can amend it (the law) in a period of time when we can investigate the issue further. Maybe council wants to look into it more and find out where it will work best in the borough.”

Serl i n explai ne d that it is not an instantaneous process to pass an ordinance allowing for marijuana, but rather one where any draft ordinance would require a review by the borough’s Zoning Board before council takes action.

“We just don’t have much time,” said Serlin with the Aug. 21 deadline approaching. “I don’t think we have much of a choice.”

Council President Bonnie Haines said that she would support the prohibition “as long as we can revisit it within months after we do this.”

“I am just not in a position to say a blanket ‘no’ if we have an opportunity to generate revenue,” Haines declared. “I don’t want to say ‘no’ and then we can’t change it for five

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TRANSPLANT (Continued from Page 1)

due to many years of smoking, including circulatory issues and COPD, which had pretty much curtailed the functioning of his left lung. And at a point last winter, these circumstances came together with the Coronavirus pandemic that raged through the country in what might be called a perfect storm of medical complications.

The crisis began when Williams underwent arterial bypass surgery in his leg that did not quite go as planned, in that “they had to take everything out and redo it,” as Williams recently related in an interview with the Pine Barrens Tribune. It was after being hospitalized for that second go-round that he was found to have contracted COVID-19, which did not bode well for someone with his particular set of “pre-existing conditions,” and which did not become apparent until after his discharge.

“I started running a fever, took a couple of Tylenol and went to bed,” he recalled. “When the fever went higher, I called my primary doctor, and she sent me to the hospital.”

By that time, however, the infection had already made significant inroads, eroding the functionality of his remaining “good lung,” and had soon progressed to the point where it had given him what was categorized as “end-stage lung disease.”

As dire as that prognosis sounded, however, there was one option that he was advised might give a patient in his situation a chance for long-term survival and the eventual resumption of normal activities – a lung transplant, something Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia had only done on about half a dozen COVID-19 patients, including Williams, since January of this year (although it does an estimated 150 such transplants annually).

But in order to qualify for such a seemingly radical procedure, he would first have to ‘fit the criteria,” which included being within a certain weight range, free of any infectious disease, and able to successfully complete rehab following the surgery, as well as having damage limited only to the lungs.

Undergoing the requisite procedures, which included bloodwork, cancer screenings and a heart catherization, took a couple weeks, but ultimately confirmed his eligibility for a transplant, clearing the way for his being added on March 15 to the hospital’s list of patients awaiting a new lung (in his case, just one, which both shortened the time involved and made the surgery a bit simpler). In fact, he was on the operating table before he knew it, just four days later, although it took another month for him to be discharged and sent home, where he has been slowly recuperating – although not without two relatively short return stays in the hospital for pneumonia and a pulmonary embolism, as well as three

WWW.PINEBARRENSTRIBUNE.COM days in a rehab facility.

Williams was told, however, that setbacks such as he experienced are to be expected in the process of recovering from a procedure of this type, which takes time, requiring physical and occupational therapy in addition to weekly checkups. In the recent phone conversation with this newspaper, Williams said he is “feeling stronger and better each day” and is looking forward to being able to resume his normal life and activities, such as getting back on his boat and doing some fishing, and at some point, entering into community service again, perhaps even eventually returning to the school board.

Attesting to his determination in that

Williams fishing COVID-19.

prior

to

Photo Provided

Saturday, July 17, 2021

“The way transplants are set up is that the most critical patients go to the top of the list, and the fact that he got one so quickly had nothing to do with who he was, or where he was from, but was just because he was so ill,” the surgeon maintained.

Marchetti noted that the surgery for Williams “went very well” and confirmed that while he “had a few bumps in the road, a few complications, that is fairly normal for someone undergoing such a complex procedure.” The “biggest hurdle,” the doctor said, was that Williams “had been so sick and hospitalized for weeks prior to the surgery,” which has made the process of regaining his strength and getting back on

Photo Provided

contracting

Williams on breathing apparatus while suffering from COVID-19.

regard was his surgeon, Dr. Nathaniel Marchetti, professor of thoracic medicine and surgery at Temple’s Lewis Katz School of Medicine and medical director of the hospital’s Respiratory Intensive Care Unit, who said that when he first encountered Williams on an overnight shift, “he was basically on 100 percent oxygen, and it was pretty clear he had irreversible lung damage.

“I talked to him about the possibility of a lung transplant, which he was all for,” Marchetti told the Pine Barrens Tribune in a July 13 phone interview, noting that while most people with COVID-19 do recover, “there are some who survive but might never be able to leave the hospital” and for whom such a transplant is the only hope of getting them out of such “dire straits.”

However, performing a lung transplant under such circumstances, Marchetti ack nowledged, can be “a ver y r isky procedure,” and the very short time in which Williams went about getting his “is not the normal process,” which would usually require weeks or perhaps months of waiting for the right match.

his feet take longer than it ordinarily might.

But Marchetti described Williams as “a very driven person who is determined that he is going to get back to normal, and he is slowly but surely getting there.”

“To give you a sense of how motivated his is, he wanted to enter a fishing tournament, which would mean being out on the water all day,” the surgeon told this newspaper.

“While he was not quite ready for that, I imagine he will be soon.”

Marchetti also characterized Williams as “somebody who was willing to put up with pain and has the ability to see the end result and work toward it.”

“I am pretty sure most people, myself included, would not be able to go through what he did. There is nothing he wouldn’t do to get better, if it meant going through a brick wall,” Marchetti added.

For having given him that second chance at life (and with the benefit of a lung that works much better than the one he had before), Williams is eternally grateful to the transplant team at Temple and all those who have assisted in helping him recover,

asserting, “I don’t think I would be here today if it hadn’t been for their efforts.”

His gratitude likewise extends to the family of the donor “for making such a selfless decision during their time of loss,” and without whose having done so his odds of survival might have been sharply reduced.

But Williams, as it turned out, got an opportunity to benefit his benefactors at Temple University Hospital in return. As one of the initial subjects selected for its COVID-19 lung transplant program, he was also instrumental in publicizing it by demonstrating how a pandemic patient with such a dire prognosis could be brought back from the brink via the procedure, which has resulted in his becoming a sort of unofficial ambassador for the program in Philly.

According to Jeremy Walter, director of media relations for the Temple University Health System, PhillyVoice, a citywide magazine that often focuses on health issues, was coincidentally working on a story on COVID-related transplants and reached out to the hospital’s marketing department.

“They knew that Temple University Hospital had perfor med at least one COVID-related transplant at the time (it had, in fact, done several) and asked if any of our physicians or transplant experts involved would be willing to speak with them about it,” Walter told this newspaper in a recent phone interview. “They also asked if a patient who underwent a COVID-related transplant would be willing to speak to them. As a result of that request, two of our pulmonologists, including Dr. Marchetti, as well as Mr. Williams ended up being interviewed for what turned out to be two separate stories.” (The first of which ran in mid-May.) A month later, WPVI, did its own story on the Temple lung-transplant program that featured an interview with Williams – the first time many of the people who know him in South Jersey became aware of the full extent of the health issues that had caused him to resign from the Pinelands school board.

But as for promoting awareness back home of the true nature and extent of the ordeal he had been through, he said, “I didn’t want to make it well known.”

“My concern was more about my family’s having to deal with all this, especially since it was so touch and go at first,” he maintained.

But Williams added that he wanted to “thank the people of our communities for all their support and prayers” once they did find out and is glad about having had the opportunity to help make others with preexisting lung problems that the Coronavirus may have amplified to an “end stage” cognizant of this possible option.

Also voicing her thanks to everyone involved was Williams’ wife, Maggie, who told this newspaper that “we are so happy and fortunate that Tommy was given this See TRANSPLANT/ Page 13

Saturday, July 17, 2021

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Tabernacle Approves $5.4 Million Budget for 2021 as Well as Upgrades to Town Hall for Handicapped, But Structural Integrity of Building Under Review

Tabernacle Town Hall.

By Douglas D. Melegari Staff Writer

TABERNACLE—A $5,412,375.30 Fiscal Year 2021 budget for Tabernacle Township has been approved by the Tabernacle Township Committee, along with a project to make handicap accessible improvements to Tabernacle Town Hall, though the structural integrity of the building is reportedly now under review.

“There is a $0 increase in the local tax rate over last year,” Township Administrator Douglas Cramer told this newspaper on July 12, which was also stated by Chief Financial Officer Rodney Haines during a township committee public hearing later that day on the budget.

The local tax rate last year, according to Cramer, was “0.4620 per $100 assessed value,” meaning an owner of a property assessed at the township average of $266,952.47 will be billed an estimated $1,233 in municipal taxes.

Cramer pointed out that the value of the

Photo By Douglas D. Melegari

average assessed home had increased over last year (from around $250,000), but that it “won’t affect” what a resident will pay in municipal taxes.

Residents Stuart and Fran Brooks asked several questions during the budget public hearing, in part, pertaining to the impact that the recent shared service agreement between Tabernacle and Shamong townships, for emergency services (where the former through Tabernacle Rescue Squad [TRS] is now providing EMS services to Shamong), has on this year’s budget.

“There is a general appropriation of $30,000 for aid to volunteer ambulance companies – is this appropriation, as in past years, intended to cover the cost for ambulance service for Tabernacle residents that is not being reimbursed by insurance, otherwise known as ‘balance billing?’” Stuart Brooks asked. “Second question, is Shamong See BUDGET/ Page 8

Upstate New York Man Is Killed, Driver Hurt in One-Car 3:30 a.m. Accident in Southampton SOU T H A M P TON —A 21-ye a r- old Ossining, New York man was killed July 3 when the car in which he was a passenger swerved off Hilliards Bridge Road, near the intersection of Red Lion Road in Southampton township, striking a tree stump, utility pole and guard rail, according to New Jersey State Police at the Red Lion barracks.

The victim, identified as Roy Song, was pronounced dead at the scene of the accident, which occurred shortly after 3:30

a.m., police said.

The driver of the vehicle, Anthony Lorenz, 20, also of Ossining, was reported to have suffered “moderate injuries,” and was transported by ambulance dispatched from the Hampton Lakes EMS to Cooper University Hospital in Camden.

A second passenger, identified as Tyler Mulhern, 19, of Cohasset, Mass., was reported to have sustained minor injuries.

State police said the cause of the accident was under investigation.

Pennsylvania Man Reported Seriously Injured, 11-Year-Old Boy Hurt in Accident on Route 72 WO ODL A N D — A 39 -ye a r- ol d Pennsylvania motorist was reportedly seriously injured when a rear-end collision in the westbound lane of Route 72 in Woodland Township on the afternoon of July 11 caused his Subaru WRX to strike several trees and a utility pole, as well as less seriously injuring his 11-year-old passenger.

According to Sgt. Alejandro Goez of the New Jersey State Police, Hasani Henry, of Collingdale, Pa., the driver of a Subaru WRX that struck a Hyundai Sonata in front of it, had to be airlifted to Jersey Shore University Medical Center in Neptune

following the 4:18 p.m. accident.

The young passenger, also of Collingdale, was taken by ambulance from the Hampton Lakes EMS in Southampton to the same hospital, having sustained what Goez described as non-life-threatening injuries.

No information on the condition of either of the car’s occupants could subsequently be obtained from the hospital, despite repeated queries.

The driver and a passenger in the Sonata were uninjured, Goez said, noting that the accident, which occurred while both vehicles were moving, was under investigation.

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LOCAL NEWS / FEATURES

BUDGET

(Continued from Page 7) Township paying the cost of ambulance service provided by the TRS for uninsured Shamong residents, and if not, why not? How come Tabernacle is paying for its uninsured residents, if Shamong is not paying for its uninsured residents – when it is TRS that is doing the work, and Tabernacle residents are paying TRS $30,000 in aid to volunteer ambulance companies.

“Third, what steps are you taking to ensure Shamong is paying its fair share of the merged ambulance service costs? For example, is Shamong contributing to the bond payments for the emergency services building, which houses the equipment that will now serve Shamong residents?

Is Shamong paying anything towards the equipment, or other operating costs that Tabernacle residents are contributing to for services? Fourth, are there any anticipated revenues related to the merger of the TRS/ Shamong ambulance companies?”

Haines, in response, confirmed that the township has budgeted a $30,000 contribution to the TRS “for balance billing” as “it is in the contract between the township and TRS,” but that he would defer to Cramer on the other questions. Cramer responded that the “insurance costs that are changing” are being “applied to us as part of our shared service agreement,” and “as far as the balance billing,” Shamong is “in the same type of agreement as we are with the squad, is my understanding at this time.”

In response to other questions posed

by Fran Brooks, Haines contended that “this budget” allows for “up to a 3 percent increase in salaries,” but that such increases are set by a (separate) salary ordinance and resolution; and that Coronavirus pandemic relief monies provided by the federal

WWW.PINEBARRENSTRIBUNE.COM government are not accounted for in the budget at this time with the administrator “still in discussions about how these monies can be expended.” The township will use a “Chapter 159” to “bring these monies into the budget” when such funds become available, Haines added, noting that the funding “cannot be used for tax or debt service relief.”

“So, there are very limited things we can use it for,” Haines said.

The budget was unanimously approved by the township committee following the public hearing.

Following passage of the budget, the governing body awarded MJJ Construction, of Atco, a $108,000 contract to make improvements to Tabernacle Town Hall, including installing a new chairlift for access to the second-floor committee meeting room and making improvements to the restrooms so that they are compliant with Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) regulations.

The township committee, in awarding that contract, approved putting $78,000 in Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds toward the total project cost. The remaining amount will be “supplemented by our building improvement funds,” Cramer noted.

Committeeman Joseph Barton, however, pointed out that the municipality “was in the process of receiving a structural analysis” of town hall, and asked if that should be completed before “expending these funds on this building.”

“I think it would be prudent, before we award and start this contract, that we have a structural analysis of (town hall) so that we can decide as a committee how we will move forward with that building,” Barton maintained. “If that building has structural problems, do we want to be putting a $108,000 chairlift in it, or making any other improvements to it? I would like to see us

do the structural analysis before we expend any of these funds.”

Cramer replied that the CDBG funds “will be gone” if not expended “now,” contending the money has to be spent by September at the latest.

“Those funds will go back to the federal government, and we won’t be eligible for them again,” added Cramer, noting that the federal funds are specifically designated for the project, previously approved in late 2019.

“If we stop this project now, the $78,000 will be gone.”

Barton then asked, “When will his report (from the structural engineer) be done so we know the integrity of the building?”, to which Cramer replied “September,” unless there is a “red flag,” which would be brought to the attention of the governing body.

A structural engineer, along with the township’s constr uction official, was exp ected to p erfor m a “preli m inar y inspection” of town hall on July 15, Cramer noted. The township administrator told this newspaper during the early afternoon of that day that he was still waiting for the structural engineer to arrive.

He further explained that the need for a structural analysis came about after the township committee recently began exploring the possibility of an expansion, either possibly building an addition to town hall or a separate, new building – an idea that “came out of a review about putting solar at a landfill.” The landfill has since been under consideration by the township committee as a possible new location for the township Department of Public Works.

But the governing body, the administrator said, in wanting to determine the best step forward, tasked municipal officials to start looking at “all the buildings and properties we own around town.”

“We went around and looked at the buildings to see what the possibilities and

Saturday, July 17, 2021 conditions are,” he said. “From that report we gave to the committee, it (the governing body) asked us to do structural analysis to see if town hall is capable of having an addition put on it.”

And since the municipality is also looking at upgrading the “mechanical” aspects of the “firehouse, old EMS building and annex building,” Cramer said, it was felt that it was best to “put all the projects together and come back to the committee with the analysis and cost.”

Town hall, he noted, with an “old rubble foundation,” was built in 1875, with major structural work performed on it in the early 90s, and “a lot of work was done to the building” about two years ago. Evaluation of the building, Cramer concluded, is “something that needs to be done” to give the committee “direction on where we want to go.”

Construction Official Tom Boyd, during a June 14 township committee workshop meeting, when discussing his own findings through the initial evaluation report, noted that town hall is “getting quite cramped” due to the “demands put on the municipality, i.e., storage of records.” He added that the “deadloads” being put on the “structural members” are “increasing in values,” and that the building was “constructed before any type of construction codes.”

“Some of the structural members have a negative defection,” he said. “If you walk into the building, you will notice the unevenness of the floors and the walls aren’t always plum and level. If the building is going to be continued to be used when renovations are undergone, I believe it would be prudent to have an engineering evaluation as to the structural members of the building.”

Boyd pointed out there has been “water intrusion,” but “not flooding,” of the town See BUDGET/ Page 13

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Liquor License Renewed for Shuttered Tabernacle Inn with Reluctant Committee Saying It’s ‘Stuck in Corner’

In-Person Services to begin July 11th @ 9:30 am in the Family Life Center

The now-shuttered Tabernacle Inn.

By Douglas D. Melegari Staff Writer

TABERNACLE —A plenar y ret ai l consumption license, commonly referred to as a liquor license, for Leisure Time Inn, Inc., t/a Tabernacle Inn, was reluctantly renewed for the “2021-22 term” by the Tabernacle Township Committee on July 12.

Its renewal was despite Committeeman Joseph Barton expressing on April 26 his desire to “force the liquor license to not be renewed,” which his colleagues seemed to agree with at the time, and the item being tabled during a June 14 workshop committee meeting, after an attempt to renew it died with a 2-1 vote (a majority of committee members had to approve of its renewal, and two members were absent that day last month with Committeeman Robert Sunbury voting “no”).

But Township Solicitor William Burns cautioned May 10 against not renewing the license for the inn, which has been closed

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since early 2017 and is now for sale, concerned that the township committee taking such action would subject the municipality to litigation and jeopardize the license.

It is the township committee’s desire to see the inn reopened that resulted in its reluctance to renew the license.

“Really, there are three options (the committee could pursue), and I am remiss in saying I don’t think any are the best,” Burns maintained on May 10.

The first, he said, is for it to just “renew the license in due course.”

Another option, according to Burns, would be for the committee to “reject the license” as had been previously suggested, which would “amount to a taking of the license by the fact you are no longer renewing it because they are simply not operating as a bar.”

And since, under current state law, municipalities are allowed to issue one liquor

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LOCAL NEWS / FEATURES

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Computers in Tabernacle’s Emergency Services Building Found to Have Ransomware; Health Info Not Put at Risk

By Douglas D. Melegari Staff Writer

TABERNACLE —Ransomware was discovered to be on the computers inside Tabernacle Township’s Emergency Services Building late last month, a matter that has been referred to by a local official as a “cyber incident.”

Howeve r, a c c ord i ng to Tow n sh ip Administrator Doug Cramer, no health i n for m at ion wa s c omprom is e d, nor

Saturday, July 17, 2021

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personnel information.

“That is all kept offsite,” he said of why the information was not compromised.

The ransomware, Cramer told the Tabernacle Township Committee during its July 12 meeting, is believed to have been installed on the computers sometime between June 26 and June 27.

“It showed up around the 28th or 29th of

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Large tree taken down by tornado on Sycamore Drive in Little Egg Harbor Township on July 9.

TORNADO (Continued from Page 1)

wind. This wasn’t like that. It felt like a train was coming through the house. It was a terrible, terrible scary feeling.”

After the noise stopped, Bonansinga said, she looked around the house to see if everything appeared to be all right and peered through a window to check if her umbrella was still up. But It wasn’t until she saw the police and fire department vehicles coming down the block that she ventured outside to discover the shambles a large part of her yard was in, along with a section of her home’s roof and chimney that a large oak tree had struck after being uprooted by the tornado.

“Oh my God, I can’t believe this,” was how she recounted her reaction the following afternoon to the Pine Barrens Tribune while sitting on her still-intact back deck with a group of neighbors, and Don Leonardo, a contractor who had come by “to secure the site” and help in the cleanup efforts, which had been underway since the morning.

Answering a phone call from a friend who had heard someone say there had been a “tornado down on Sycamore,” she responded that it “definitely” felt like one.

Outside the house next door, C.J. LaFragola told this newspaper that he had been sleeping downstairs with his dog when he heard the wind pick up and a few minutes later, “multiple bangs.” Shortly afterward, he said, the Little Egg Harbor Police and Fire departments were outside arousing residents to “make sure everybody in the neighborhood was OK.” That was when he saw what the force of the tornadic winds had done in the rear of the home, which belongs to his parents, a large tree having fallen across the entire backyard and snapped in half, with one part crashing onto a stockade fence and a limb damaging the windows of an adjacent shed, and the other end having smashed a section of a deck and the railing surrounding it that LaFragola said he and his father had just finished working on.

Directly across the street, Linda Zachary said she had been up at around 3:30 a.m. when “I heard a rumble” and the house

started to shake.

“Things were clanking, things were hitting the house,” she said.

When she and her husband, Bill, went outside, she said, the yard was covered with debris, including a tree that “wasn’t ours,” with a good-size ornamental red maple tree that had been totally uprooted. By afternoon, she said, her husband had already cleaned up much of the mess, both on their lawn and that of their neighbors, and had cut up the tree that had blown from somewhere else. But the area was still strewn with fallen trees and limbs, the removal of which would obviously require heavier equipment.

The severity of the situation was also evident from the appearance of a car sitting in the driveway of a nearby house that had reportedly been struck by another tree, which had been removed from the scene by afternoon.

The affected area appeared to be limited to a stretch of the curving street at the end of Harbortown Boulevard in the Mystic Island section of the township, with nearby homes showing no sign of damage. It was one of three sites in South Jersey that were checked out by a meteorologist from the National Weather Service to determine what type of weather event might have occurred at any of them as Elsa blew through the region.

The federal agency later confirmed that it was indeed a tornado that had singled out Sycamore Drive, as well as causing minor damage on Rosemont Lane and Harbourtown Boulevard, with an EF-0 rating and estimated peak winds of 80 mph, a path length of 0.29 miles and a maximum width of 110 yards, which began at 3:33 a.m. and ended just a minute later – five minutes prior to the tornado warning going out on cellphones to residents of the area, including those who were directly in its path. One tree was tossed 50 feet, according to the National Weather Service.

Tornadoes, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Centers for Environmental information, are infrequent occurrences in Ocean County, where only 11 have occurred in the past 50 years, seven of which involved property damage and one an injury or death. Little Egg Harbor Township is also listed by the website Homefacts as having a “very low” risk level for such events.

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There will not be any interruption in the provision of emergency medical services, or fire suppression and rescue.

“I want to be crystal clear on behalf of the committee that services are in place, and will continue to be in place, and the residents of Woodland will not be at any higher risk then they were before.”

But Burns, in making that statement, did not clarify who exactly would be providing the “services.”

“What do we have in place that is covering the town?” asked Woodland resident Barbara Ball during public comment, in response to Burns’ statement.

Woodland Mayor Wi l l iam “Bi l ly” DeGroff attempted to continue the recently

INN

(Continued from Page 9) license for every 3,000 people, and Tabernacle has a population of only 7,000 people, “there is a possibility that the license would no longer exist,” should the public body reject it, or that “it would revert to the state.” The license issued to Tabernacle Inn is grandfathered from the current population requirement, Burns pointed out.

“It would no longer be a grandfathered use,” said Burns of if the license were to be rejected by the governing body.

The solicitor contended that rejecting the license would “also incur, in all likelihood, liability” because “there has to be just cause” for doing such a thing. He added, however, that whether any litigation from the inn owner would be successful depended on whether “denial of that license is arbitrary and capricious.”

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implemented policy (started June 21) of not answering questions from the public and having “two-way dialogue” with them during the public “comment” portion of committee meetings, replying to Ball, “Thank you for your public comments.”

“Do we have any way of knowing where they are coming from?” asked Ball again, with the mayor again replying, “thank-you …” before Viscardi interjected, remarking, “seeing how you work at 178 (the call numbers for Hampton Lakes Emergency Squad) still, 178-439 (the latter the call numbers for Tabernacle Rescue Squad) will be automatic dispatch on EMS.” But Ball then contended “178” had been “taken off the grids,” claiming, “I know this for a fact.” “(This) concerns me for residents of Route 72, and my own development, Lebanon Lakes, because if 439 is coming in, they are Nevertheless, rejecting the license, Burns maintained, would just “really complicate the matter in a couple different ways.”

The final option, Burns said, is that the governing body could “condemn the building” for a “public purpose” and “then pay the license holder the fair market value.”

However, according to the solicitor, not only is there a chance that the license would also revert to the state in that instance, but the township would then be “somewhat hard pressed” to “turn around and sell” a building that it condemned.

Both Barton and Committeewoman Nancy McGinnis expressed that the township committee is “stuck in a corner,” to which their colleagues agreed, ultimately resulting in the outcome of the 5-0 July 12 vote.

“There is not much of an option other than to let the license hang out there, and someday, hopefully, Tabernacle Inn is sold, or rejuvenated in some way in which the license gets used,” Barton said.

bypassing a station that has a 24/7 paid crew inhouse to go a further distance,” Ball said.

Ball added that she was concerned about the “extra, added time” involved in “getting care to our residents.”

Tabernacle Rescue, Ball maintained, is closer to the residents located at “the backside of Chatsworth,” but Hampton Lakes Emergency Squad is closer to the Lebanon Lakes and Route 72 parts of the municipality.

“You are bypassing a station that has a crew,” she contended.

Viscardi replied he would call the county to investigate, but that “there were no changes in the grids on our part – ever.”

The discussion between Ball and Viscardi, however, indicated that Woodland was still reliant on mutual aid at the moment, and that the Woodland company was apparently not in service, despite Viscardi’s special meeting

attendance and Burns remarking during the session that “the committee unequivocally supports the members of the fire department and first aid squad, thanks them for their service, and unequivocally supports the organization that is the volunteer fire and first aid squad.”

A post on the Woodland company’s Facebook page on the day prior to the special meeting noted that it was “currently in discussions with our township regarding a restructuring of the department” and that “we are still actively recruiting members,” and urged those interested in joining to get in touch with the emergency agency.

Deputy Mark Herndon, at the conclusion of the July 9 special meeting, remarked that “very soon we are going to have a member drive” to “try and get members.”

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CANNABIS (Continued from Page 3)

Prime later told this newspaper that the cannabis industry is “probably the biggest new industry in years” and that “council decided that it is simply too big to permit these uses without some guidance from the state regulatory authorities, and without regulations that govern the cannabis industry statewide.”

“The best analogy that I can provide is that a municipality can issue plenary retail consumption or distribution liquor licenses, but only in accordance with ABC (Division of Alcoholic Beverage Control) regulations,”

DUMPSTER (Continued from Page 4)

way radio replacement, firefighting tools and equipment, building improvements to the South Street garage, improvements to township traffic lights for generator power, toolboxes, weather lightning detection systems for municipal parks and barrier removal/handicapped accessibility on Union and Allen streets.

The other bond ordinance appropriates $2,552,137 and authorizes the issuance of

COMPUTERS (Continued from Page 10)

June,” he contended.

The township, since the ransomware was discovered, has been working with both the New Jersey State Police Cyber Security

GUTTER

S

WWW.PINEBARRENSTRIBUNE.COM

Prime said. “Similarly, a municipality may ultimately decide to issue any of the commercial cannabis licenses in accordance with state regulations. But until they are adopted, under the statute, the township must either ban the cannabis commercial uses or permit them without regulations.”

More than 100 other municipalities in New Jersey have reportedly taken the cautious route and banned cannabis businesses until at least the regulations from the commission are released and subsequently reviewed.

Ne ig hb or i ng Sh a mong Tow n sh ip, however, recently approved of cannabis businesses in three redevelopment areas, taking somewhat of a game of chance by

setting several of its own use standards.

“If we do not have any guidance from the state, we can’t analyze and do studies in terms of where we want to put these businesses in the township,” contended Councilman Frank Czekay at a recent council meeting. “So, it makes no sense for us to spend money doing it now, and then they issue regulations, which we would have to spend money again (to review and implement). Being it is already June, even if the commission issued regulations tomorrow, we would not have enough time to do a study. It makes no sense to not opt-out.”

Prime, also during a recent council meeting, noted that there is a “tax revenue

aspect,” in which municipalities can place a 2 percent sales tax on cannabis manufacturers, cultivators and retailers, and a 1 percent sales tax on wholesalers, and therefore, allowing them might be “something you want to consider down the road.”

Medford Mayor Charles “Chuck” Watson, during council’s June 15 meeting, said he is “certainly willing to revisit” allowing for cannabis businesses in the future, but the township is taking action to “protect ourselves” until “some of the regulations are put down and we understand it.”

For now, the mayor declared, “it is the law in Medford that it is not allowed.”

$1,252,137 in utility improvement notes.

“This utility capital budget consists of a substantial new amount of water meters needed, a water main replacement for White Pine and Evergreen drives, a lot of work out at the sewer treatment plant and eliminating the Golfview Drive Station, among other smaller things,” Watson said.

This newspaper previously reported that a sewage pump station on Golfview Drive is scheduled to be eliminated in favor of a gravity system, with nearly $800,000 budgeted in the utility capital budget for the project.

DOWNTOWN does not bring about enough relief, while Denn expressed that the “50 percent idea would get rid of a lot of problems,” ultimately arriving at a compromise. Prime pointed out that requiring only 50 percent of the initial off-street parking space requirements, for example, would mean that restaurants and taverns would have to provide only one offstreet parking space for every six seats.

A further revised draft ordinance was

introduced for first reading during council’s July 6 meeting, with a second reading and public hearing scheduled for July 20.

Restaurants, breweries and retail shops in the village would only have to “meet 50 percent of the original requirements,” according to Prime, with the zoning officer put in charge of granting exemptions.

“We are trying to make it easier to get things we want downtown, such as restaurants, retail and shops that cause more people to come on Main Street to shop existing shops,” Watson concluded.

Denn noted of the forthcoming relief, “the sooner the better.”

and Communications Division and Joint Insurance Fund (JIF)’s Cyber Security Division, Cramer said.

“We are aware of how the intrusion occurred and we will be pursuing restitution of our additional costs from them when we get through this,” Cramer declared.

Cramer later told this newspaper on July

15 that officials “don’t know specifically what operation it happened under,” but that “nobody believes it is malicious in how it got here” or that “we do not think somebody came here with the intent” of installing the ransomware, but rather it is suspected that it “was sleeping” on somebody’s computer and “they didn’t

know it.”

No charges, he said, have been filed in the matter.

Trooper Charles Marchan, a spokesman for the state police, told this newspaper on July 15 that “our Cyber Crimes Unit is not investigating a ransomware incident in Tabernacle.”

(Continued from Page 2)

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opportunity to have a second chance at life,” and that “to say this journey was rough on the family is an understatement.”

Her husband, she revealed, “wasn’t allowed any visitors due to COVID, so I only managed to see him three times in three months for a total of an hour and a half.”

“To not be able to see your loved one, especially when they are going through something like this, definitely takes a toll, not only on the family, but the patient,” Maggie Williams said.

After he received the new lung, his wife added, “we were able to Facetime (via iPad and cellphone) almost daily, and when he was feeling better, he would text throughout the day.” She also noted that she would call the nurse for updates twice a day, and the doctors would “call me with updates periodically, but without actually being

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there, you miss a lot of what is going on.”

Tommy Williams’ experience has also moved him to issue a couple pieces of cautionary advice that he hopes might help people avoid the kind of ordeal he has been through.

Regarding the pandemic that directly led to his transplant surgery, even with vaccinations, he believes, we are “heading for trouble not wearing masks” when exposed to crowds.

“We are not yet out of the woods and are letting our guard down a little too far, too soon and too quickly,” he contended.

He would also strongly urge that young people resist the pressure or the temptation to take up smoking, which led to the “preexisting condition” he had when struck by COVID. While not nearly as much was known about the health consequences of doing so back when he began as a teenager, he noted, with all the information that is out there now, “anyone who would start smoking today is really foolish.”

loans regardless of credit and note that if a credit repair company does business only over the phone it is illegal to request any money before delivering its service. All funds are based in U.S. dollars. Toll free numbers may or may not reach Canada.

BUDGET

(Continued from Page 8) hall’s basement, which has resulted in “some rot” of the sill plates. There are also some “holes” in the building’s siding and the front roof of its porch “appears to be damaged.”

The main roof, he added, “looks OK.”

EMERGENCY (Continued from Page 11)

Ted Toth, who claimed to be a former officer of the “Chatsworth Fire Company,” suggested that the governing body consider offering an incentive program to would-be members.

And in the wake of questions regarding the whereabouts of federal grant monies (totaling $403,462 last year) and township contributions (totaling over $300,000 since 2016) that the

Water intrusion, according to Boyd, was also occurring in the basement of the annex building, which houses the township’s construction and tax accessor offices.

Barton, during the latest committee meeting on July 12, ultimately voted to award the contract for the handicap accessible project, along with the rest of his colleagues.

Woodland company has been recently provided with, after revelations that the emergency services entity is unable to afford a new tanker truck to replace one auctioned last year and ambulances reportedly in need of replacement without the help of outside assistance, Herndon, also at the conclusion of the special session, noted that the Woodland company is “looking for someone to either take over, or at least take some of the load from the present treasurer of the fire department – someone who can help with bookkeeping in some way, shape or form.”

Page 14 ♦

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(Continued from Page 4) years. … They (state legislators) certainly know how much time it takes to do these things (pass local laws), and we haven’t been provided with adequate time. I would like to start an investigation and discussion, however, as to where we can put it, how we have to regulate it and what type of revenue we can generate from it.”

Councilman George Ward, who cast the lone dissenting vote to introduce the prohibition, declared that he thought council “ought to look into it” because he could otherwise see a situation where a facility opens “100 yards down from the (train) tracks,” or just outside the borough limits in Pemberton Township, and “we lose all the revenue.”

“They (the residents) will walk through town, go out there, and we’ll lose all the money,” contended Ward, pointing out that municipalities can’t prohibit delivery.

Resident Diane Fanucci, who previously urged council to consider allowing for cannabis businesses to bring in needed revenue and ratables (municipalities can enact by ordinance a local cannabis tax that cannot exceed 2 percent for a cannabis cultivator, manufacturer, and/or retailer; and 1 percent for wholesalers, according to the league), called vacant land in the borough on County Route 530 “the perfect spot for a marijuana dispensary.”

“We don’t have to cultivate it,” she declared. “We can just distribute it. Why not make that money?”

The June 21 council session, the first in-person meeting of the year due to the Coronavirus pandemic, featured numerous complaints and concerns.

Resident Harold Francis, who lives on a one-way street in the borough, pressed officials about a delay in recycling pick-up and demanded to know when the situation would be resolved. He said residents should be told to bring their recyclables back inside until pickup is rescheduled. He said that given the nature of his street, residents have

no choice but to put all their recyclables for pickup in front of his property.

“For two weeks, I have had nothing but flies, and stinky cans from cat food sitting in front of my house,” he said. “Is there something we can do about this? If not, I am just going to drag them out in the street and leave them! Because I do not want that in front of my house! My whole front porch is full of flies! It is disgusting!”

Borough Mayor Harold Griffin replied that the delay was the result of a personnel issue and that “not enough people want to work,” adding that recycling is the responsibility of the county. He explained that Occupational Training Center, which collects recycling for the county, was experiencing a truck driver shortage (as previously reported by this newspaper). The borough’s recycling coordinator noted that the county is “doing the best they can,” and asked for patience, contending that the hope is the matter will “work itself out,” perhaps as soon as July.

“When I walk out my door, I got to walk between blue cans, flies, stink and everything else!” Francis contended.

Another resident who spoke said “she was very concerned” about truck traffic on both Hanover and Elizabeth streets (the main thoroughfares through the borough’s downtown) and reported that it was causing her house to shake, and she has observed the windows of a neighboring home shake. She noted that she was concerned “not about the bridge itself, but about our roads, what’s underneath, and the homes along the roads” and questioned whether a weight limit could be placed on the Hanover Street Bridge to deter the truck traffic.

Serlin pointed out that Hanover Street is a county road, with Griffin noting Elizabeth Street is as well. Griffin remarked that “after hearing some comments about the bridge,” he called the county engineering department and was assured “the bridge was built to specs” and “there was nothing structurally wrong with it,” adding “it should be able to accommodate all the tractor trailers or whatever.”

“I don’t like those big trucks coming

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through town either,” contended Griffin, who added that he approached the county several times about instituting a weight limit on the Hanover Street Bridge and reducing the speed limit on Elizabeth Street, to no avail.

A man stated from his seat, “Don’t they realize that the trucks they have nowadays weren’t around when they built these homes!”

Another resident pointed out that “a number of sodium lamps” along the roads in the Hearthstone retirement community “are out” and “wondered if they might be replaced at some point.” Griffin replied that they can be replaced.

T h at s a me re side nt a ske d for a n explanation as to why flower baskets were missing along some borough streets for at least two years, including in Hearthstone.

Griffin contended that an electrician “does not like us to have them there,” but that he was not given “what I consider a real good reason for not doing it,” before later remarking that he recalled a “logical reason for it” was offered. Haines pointed out there are “no antique light posts going into Hearthstone.”

“Just so you know, I would like to have them (the baskets) going into Hearthstone too,” Griffin added.

Another resident, who praised officials for now posting ordinances and resolutions online ahead of council meetings, brought to the attention of officials that a light at the top of the borough water tower was out at least for two days prior to the council meeting.

Fanucci, who aired numerous grievances, pointed out that there were a “million chopped up balloons among goose poop” left behind at a park in the borough following a recent large party and contended that the balloons had since melted into the grass.

She called it a “health hazard,” especially for small children, and inquired whether the partygoers received a permit to be there.

“T h i ngs c an e at the m,” she said, contending that the borough should require a security deposit when allowing parties to be hosted at the park to guarantee that the parcel is cleaned by organizers afterwards.

“They can go into the creek.”

Fanucci, who is known in the borough for volunteering to clean-up litter, noted that people tell her that she does not have to do it, but that “If I don’t do it, it will look like crap out there and I am not living in a town that looks like crap!”

Fanucci then asked why are “certain businesses in this town still not required to recycle,” contending that she had raised the issue a while ago, adding that “we need to enforce” litter laws.

She also called on council to reopen the borough municipal building five days per week, contending that she recalled the costcutting measure to reduce the borough work week to four days only being a temporary one until “everyone retired.”

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Haines responded that the decision had been made “as a collective body several years ago” and “nobody retired yet,” and that “it doesn’t seem to be an issue for the majority of the residents because nobody comes here to complain about it,” prompting Fanucci to call the closure of borough hall on Fridays “ridiculous.”

“We want to open it five days a week,” said Councilman Terry Jerome. “We came to a decision as to how we were going to proceed and how we could proceed given our human resources circumstances. We just haven’t gotten there yet.”

Fanucci, in continuing to go down a “list,” said that there should be “global robotic calls,” or reverse 911 calls put out by the borough to disseminate information such as about recycling delays, because not everyone has the capability to receive Nixle text message alerts, and the municipality should also purchase a “cheap marquee” to “prominently” display the messages outside borough hall.

“Everybody else has one!” she declared.

“Why can’t we do something like that?!”

Resident Abigail Lake praised the council, borough officials and police officers and residents for coming to her aid recently and added that the town looks “very nice with the baskets and flowers,” but then chided the party responsible for maintaining a sign for Odd Fellows Cemetery (next to borough hall), asserting that it “looks atrocious.”

“You can’t even read it!” she said. “And I don’t know who is cutting the grass, but whoever it is better get their lawn mower resharpened too! It is awful.”

Another resident pointed out that Simpkins Lane, “in front of my house” has a “a pretty big deterioration going on” and wanted to know how it could get on the list of needed repairs. Griffin said he would have someone look at the road.

It was also reported during the meeting by Councilman Steven Fenster that there were “sinkholes” or “depressions” developing at the intersection of Reynolds and Hough streets, and on the southern end of Davis Street.

Fenster contended the one on the southern end of Davis Street is the “third one that we now have,” with Borough Engineer William Wentzien noting that he is watching all of them and giving them identifiers.

“I will assume the day will come where we have to say, ‘We have to do something,’” said Wentzien of the Davis Street situation. “But we are definitely watching because there are a few of them now.”

T he e ng i ne e r, du r i ng h i s r e p or t , announced that Jane Street was “proceeding toward construction” with the improvement project expected to go out to bid within two weeks, and that he is pursuing a New Jersey Department of Transportation (NJDOT) grant on behalf of the borough to obtain funding to repave both Egbert and Reynolds streets.

Page 16 ♦

LOCAL NEWS / FEATURES

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Saturday, July 17, 2021

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