At our last meeting on June 27th, time was spent discussing additional changes to the Christmas Tree Ordinance and the Tree Ordinance. The Christmas Tree Ordinance was originally being changed to reduce the permit fee from $1,500 to $500 as this was felt to be too onerous for the vendors to pay. The additional change now being passed is to waive the permit fee altogether for service organizations (e.g., Boy and Girl Scouts) holding such a sale. I personally do not agree with that stance. When fundraising is held by an organization, there are costs that are involved in whatever form that fundraising takes. I don’t believe that Livingston, as a Township, should be making a contribution to those service organizations by waiving the fee. Permit fees are in place to defray Township costs. Individuals can make their contributions however they want; it is not the Town’s place to make the contribution for them.
The Tree ordinance is still being tweaked. There is a fine line that needs to be drawn between having an ordinance that keeps people from clear cutting their property indiscriminately – to the detriment of their neighbors and the environment – and impinging on personal freedoms. There is also a fine line to draw as to how much the Town can charge someone for cutting down “their own” trees. We seem to be almost there – but not quite.
Members of the Deer Committee came to make a presentation regarding expanding the deer hunt. This apparently is causing some concern in the Town, as people are afraid of harm coming to their property and/or themselves from the hunters. My husband, who sits on the Deer Committee, and I have discussed this at length. The hunters are very concerned for safety and are willing to abide by more stringent rules than legally necessary or mandated by the State. They also understand that keeping good public relations regarding the locations of the hunt and its operation is paramount. Therefore, I think we can be confident that this hunt will proceed smoothly and discretely. The hunters all understand that it is more important to keep the Township populace’s good will and to maintain public safety than to bag the deer.
Finally, there was a discussion of the contract for architectural services for building a new Department of Public Works (DPW) facility and for a move of the Health Department from the Hillside Community Center to the Town Hall. For those musical theater aficionados out there, ‘Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets’ is sung by Lola, the Devil’s assistant, in “Damn Yankees”. I think that the scheme to start looking a build a new DPW facility at this time may be coming from the same place as Lola. First, I think that starting to look for sites for a new DPW facility is premature when it will be years before the Town can afford a new one – if we even need a new one. Some on the Town Council say that we need to be proactive, not reactive, and that it can take years to get permits and plans together. In this case I think that it is still premature to be proactive. There is no burning need to have a new DPW – other than that is what Lola wants. The rationale I have heard regarding having a new DPW facility is that we can’t garage all the trucks and cars (poor cars have to be parked outside) and that there is insufficient storage. There is also the fact that a stream runs through the current DPW facility location - thereby not allowing usage of the land across the stream. At this time, and in the foreseeable future, a new DPW facility is a ‘nice to have’ not a ‘need to have’. And, when ‘shared services’ are spouted, I concur with the sentiment of “Let someone else build it and we’ll share theirs!”
The second part of the proposed contract is to move part of the Health Department from the Community Center to the Town Hall. As I have been told, the second floor of the Town Hall was built in the hopes that we could share the facility with the Board of Education. That didn’t happen. Now we want to move Vital Statistics from Hillside to the Town Hall. Why? Because there is no public transportation to Hillside and people need to get birth certificates. We’ve managed so far – and I don’t think we need to spend the money for moving and additional overhead that would be required to manage a ‘split’ department!
Finally, the Town Manager has requested a courtesy counter to be put in her office as an ‘add on’ to the contract. This was to avoid people just walking into the area when no one was at the ‘service’ desk. I was told that she would not debate her request and that I was free to vote No. I will – given that I can think of three ways off the top of my head to take care of the issue that would not cost anything – let alone $1,900 for the plan and who knows how much for the execution.
So there you have it. We all want many things – but I refuse to reach into the citizens of Livingston’s pockets to pay for it. I know the contract amount is minimal – with a minimum of $14,800 to be spent. But it’s $14,000 here and $14,000 there and pretty soon it’s real money. Let’s turn our back on Lola and spend it when we NEED it.
