- 1 - 1 BOROUGH OF JERSEY CITY PLANNING BOARD JERSEY CITY, NEW JERSEY 2 In Re: ) TRANSCRIPT OF 3 ) PUBLIC HEARING ) PROCEEDINGS 4 ___________________) 5 Hudson County Planning Board 567 Pavonia Avenue 6 Freeholders Chambers, 3rd Floor Jersey City, New Jersey 07306 7 Wednesday, June 27, 2007 6:29 pm 8 B E F O R E: 9 10 STEPHEN MARKS, Division Chief, Secretary 11 THOMAS A. CALVANICO, ESQ. 12 MICHAEL A. HOLLOWAY 13 RUSHABH METHA 14 RENEE BETTINGER 15 MARY AVAGLIANO 16 DANIEL CHOFFO, Chairman 17 JUDE FITZGIBBONS 18 JEFFREY DUBLIN 19 KENNEDY NG 20 DEMETRIO ARENCIBIA 21 Reported By: 22 MARK WEINBERG 23 REPORTING SERVICES ARRANGED THROUGH VERITEXT/NEW JERSEY REPORTING COMPANY 24 25B Vreeland Road, Suite 301 Florham Park, New Jersey 07932 25 Tel No.: (973) 410-4040 Fax: (973) 410-1313 - 2 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Good evening 2 everyone. I'd like to call the meeting of the 3 Hudson County Planning Board to order for this 4 evening, June 20th. Mr. Marks, has this meeting 5 been properly advertised? 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Yes, Mr. 7 Chairman. The meeting has been properly advertised 8 in accordance with the New Jersey Open Public 9 Meetings. 10 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Mr. Secretary, 11 a roll call. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 13 Arencibia? 14 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Here. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 16 Avagliano? Commissioner Bettinger? 17 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Here. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 19 DeDomenico is not present. Commissioner Dublin is 20 not present. Commissioner Fitzgibbons? 21 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Here. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 23 Holloway? 24 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Here. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner - 3 - 1 Mehta is not present for the moment. Commissioner 2 NG? 3 COMMISSIONER NG: Here. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 5 Choffo? 6 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Here. 7 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 8 we have a quorum. 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Perfect. Can 10 we please stand and salute the flag. 11 (Pledge of Allegiance is 12 recited) 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Go ahead. 14 SECRETARY MARKS Mr. Chairman, 15 the first appointment of business is review and 16 adoption of meeting minutes from both April 18th, 17 2007, which was the regular Planning Board meeting 18 and April 25th, 2007, which was the special public 19 hearing -- public meeting on the Hudson County Parks 20 Master Plan for 2007. 21 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: I 22 make a motion to approve the minutes as read. 23 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Second. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 25 on a motion to approve the minutes made by - 4 - 1 Commissioner Fitzgibbons, second by Commissioner 2 Bettinger. Commissioner Arencibia? 3 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 5 Avagliano? 6 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 7 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 8 Bettinger? 9 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 10 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 11 Fitzgibbons? 12 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 14 Holloway? 15 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 17 NG? 18 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 20 Choffo? 21 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Aye. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 23 motion passed. 24 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I'd just like 25 to make an announcement tonight since we have a - 5 - 1 large crowd. Anyone that's going to address the 2 board, if they could try to speak clearly into the 3 microphone and spell their name so our court 4 stenographer doesn't have any problems with any 5 names. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 7 before we get to the applications scheduled for 8 public hearing this evening we have Chris Henry from 9 Urbitran and Associates. Hudson County was the 10 beneficiary of a grant from the North Jersey 11 Transportation Planning Authority to do a bus 12 circulation, actually it was a bus infrastructure -- 13 bus and jitney infrastructure study. I'll let 14 Mr. Henry explain. He has a brief presentation 15 which he'd like to give over. 16 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 17 MR. HENRY: Good afternoon. My 18 name is Chris Henry, representing Urbitran 19 Associates. And as Mr. Marks said, we were retained 20 by the county to conduct a bus circulation and 21 infrastructure study which is in its closing stages 22 now. So I'd just like to give a brief overview of 23 the study process and some of the results. 24 The primary project goals including 25 looking at improvements to existing physical - 6 - 1 infrastructure to improve the efficiency, safety and 2 traffic flow for public transit and by extension for 3 all traffic in Hudson County. We wanted to better 4 understand the jitney operations, that's a small van 5 and it's from the private transit companies in the 6 county to address some safety and operational 7 concerns. Also looked for opportunities to link the 8 new Hudson County Plaza complex to the existing 9 transit network to maximize accessibility for both 10 employees and clients. And finally, throughout the 11 entire project we engaged the public through 12 meetings of the stakeholders, public open houses and 13 what we call drop-in sessions, speaking to transit 14 riders at some of the major transit hubs throughout 15 the county. 16 As far as infrastructure improvements are 17 concerned, we went through a lengthy data collection 18 process and an inventory of existing transit 19 services to see where ridership is highest and what 20 the busiest transit corridors are in the county. 21 This gave us a list of preliminary corridors and 22 hubs from which we worked to prioritize these 23 locations to give the study more of a focus for 24 detailed data collection and some primary data 25 collection that would help us develop - 7 - 1 recommendations and ultimately these recommendations 2 will be ranked according to which are seen as most 3 easily implemented as well as which would have the 4 likely -- the largest benefit for transit users and 5 the county as a whole. 6 Some very quick examples range from very 7 low cost, easy to implement solutions such as better 8 markings at bus stops. This picture shows a bus 9 stop on Boulevard East that is adequate in size 10 however the lack of markings often leads passengers 11 to wait closer to the curb. The buses stop where 12 the passengers wait and that can lead to buses being 13 stuck in the intersection and unnecessary traffic 14 congestion and delays. Some simple paving and 15 markings would help alleviate these situations. 16 Mid-range solutions, we looked on a 17 corridor level at several locations such as Bergen 18 Line Avenue in Union City, West New York and North 19 Bergen. This diagram shows an example of striping 20 and painting that could be done throughout the 21 corridor. No physical changes necessary but a 22 better chanelization of traffic flow, instead of one 23 wide lane helping to narrow the traffic lane 24 throughout most of the corridor, provide left-turn 25 lanes as well as move bus stops, typically, to the - 8 - 1 far side of an intersection to help alleviate 2 transit flow and all traffic in the corridor. 3 And finally, we looked at a few more 4 involved solutions, some physical infrastructure 5 changes, this being a diagram of Bergamot Avenue 6 (phonetic) and 32nd Street in Union City, which is a 7 bit of a complex and tricky intersection, frequently 8 congested and with a lot of transit traffic. And we 9 looked at some options to provide either a bus lane 10 or even make it two travel lanes but that might 11 require some small infrastructure improvements. So 12 we categorized those accordingly. 13 The next step in the study, we looked at 14 the jitney operations. It was important to identify 15 what the key issues are, and there are many 16 concerning safety, and that's both passenger safety 17 as well as vehicular safety, accidents and so forth. 18 Congestion throughout the county from both a transit 19 and traffic perspective. And also the regulation of 20 who's carrying out the oversight of these companies, 21 many of which owners are not clearly visible in 22 vehicles. They're not as well known as New Jersey 23 Transit or Coach USA or the larger bus carriers. So 24 it's important to understand who the operations are 25 being managed by. - 9 - 1 We did some data collection and target 2 field observations to get a better handle on the 3 quantity of jitney vehicles in the county, where the 4 busiest corridors are, who the operators are to get 5 a better understanding of frequency of service and 6 what the issues are on the street. Followed by a 7 discussion with some key stakeholders of regulatory 8 approaches of how Hudson County might tackle this 9 issue at a county level and not just municipality by 10 municipality because different towns and cities in 11 the county are affected or impacted by jitney 12 services in different ways. Some areas there's no 13 jitney service. Union City and Jersey City, in 14 particular, there's quite a bit. So our 15 recommendations for action focused on some near term 16 regulatory approaches and with an understanding of 17 what would be necessary in the future for the 18 service planning end of things as far as frequency 19 of service and so forth. 20 The issues we really came to understand 21 are that, first and foremost, oversight is limited 22 and enforcement is a challenge. There is not one 23 dedicated group that's tackling the issue, although 24 the Hudson County Prosecutor's Office has been 25 taking a lead for several years, mainly from the - 10 - 1 fraud perspective, but helping to lead some safety 2 crackdowns in conjunction with New Jersey Motor 3 Vehicle Commission as well as local law enforcement. 4 There's a big separation between who's 5 driving the vehicle, who owns the vehicle and who 6 owns the parent company that might operate an entire 7 fleet. And what we learned from the prosecutor is 8 that the paper trail between these various steps is 9 very hard to follow. And a driver who might be 10 involved in an accident and found to have poor 11 insurance, tracking who is actually insuring the 12 vehicle that he might be leasing for a day is 13 proving difficult. So we need to understand better 14 who the larger companies operating these services 15 are. 16 There's a surplus of service throughout 17 the county and that stems from both a rapidly 18 growing market and the real underpinning problem 19 which is the intense competition between private 20 companies that leads to aggressive driving 21 throughout many of the congested corridors, such as 22 Bergen Line Avenue, as well as an oversupply of 23 service that's contributing to congestion in the 24 county. 25 A very quick graphic here, just to give - 11 - 1 you a sense, the blue bars on the left are 2 traditional fixed-route buses such as New Jersey 3 Transit. The red on the right is jitney. And this 4 is just showing a relative volume of vehicles in 5 certain corridors such as JFK Boulevard, 30th and 6 31st Street in Union City, Bergamot Avenue, 7 etcetera. And there are far more jitney vehicles on 8 the road then fixed route buses, some of which is 9 understandable, because they are smaller vehicles 10 and they don't carry as many passengers. But we 11 also know that in some areas, such as Bergamot 12 Avenue, there are up to ten different companies 13 providing service and it's too much. The 14 competition, once again, is causing problems and 15 causing safety concerns among passengers. However, 16 we want to also acknowledge that the jitneys are 17 serving a very big market. And we're not advocating 18 trying to eliminate the services, we're trying to 19 get a better handle on how to regulate and how to 20 minimize this competition and unnecessary, you know 21 safety problems and so forth. 22 So in the near term we've been discussing 23 a county-wide regulatory body that could be run by 24 an agency such as the Hudson TMA, the Transportation 25 Management Association, which itself is part of the - 12 - 1 Hudson County Improvement Authority. That with the 2 empowerment of local municipalities could really 3 give a broader, county-wide approach to looking at 4 this problem and not leave it to each municipality 5 to try to fend for itself from both traffic and 6 safety perspectives. 7 What this might include is a regular task 8 force, a dedicated task force with two to four full- 9 time patrol officers, either through HCIA or through 10 the county sheriff that would give a county-wide 11 presence, all the time, keeping track on the 12 operations, the safety of the vehicles, the road 13 worthiness of the vehicles. Rather than waiting 14 every three months to do a crackdown, which has 15 proved quite effective over and over, but it's not 16 solving the larger problem. 17 We also want to look at the registration 18 of the jitney operators to allow for more regular 19 inspections, better accountability first and 20 foremost, of these services and who is owning and 21 who is operating the vehicles. The next steps, 22 which -- this is a very complicated issue. There 23 are many things to take into account but ultimately 24 we'd like to see more study given to service zones 25 or routes that might help segment some of these - 13 - 1 services, provide a better balance between the 2 existing fixed route services and the jitneys. And 3 make sure that we're serving the county residents 4 who need the transportation but we're not just 5 letting the free-for-all continue on congested 6 corridors such as JFK or Bergen Line Avenue. And 7 this could also mean limiting the number of vehicles 8 in operation. 9 Next up in our study, we looked at Hudson 10 County Plaza, which will house the sheriff's office, 11 the 9-1-1 center and many human service agencies in 12 the county, located just south of Journal Square in 13 Jersey City. And we were charged with the task of 14 looking at the existing transit in the area and how 15 this facility could better -- could be served once 16 it fully opens by fixed route transit. 17 This map shows, very quickly, that with 18 Hudson County Plaza on the right, two existing Coach 19 USA bus routes travel down Summit Avenue and Baldwin 20 Avenue. And Hudson County -- we are encouraging the 21 county to work with Coach USA to do a fairly simple 22 re-route of its number 3 service on Baldwin Avenue. 23 To travel down Academy Road, William Street and 24 Cornelison Avenue past the Hudson County Plaza site. 25 This would provide users of the site, and - 14 - 1 employees, with fairly quick access to Journal 2 Square, which obviously is a major hub in Jersey 3 City and the county. Not to mention destinations 4 farther south in Hudson County. East -- west from 5 Montgomery Street there's existing transit service 6 from Montgomery and West Side. 7 It's not as easy to re-route this service 8 just because of the grade separation of Montgomery 9 Street and Cornelison. It's not a long walk for 10 those who are able from Montgomery, but the re-route 11 is easiest with the Coach USA route. And what's 12 important to know for this study too is that as both 13 encouragement for Coach USA to either beef up its 14 existing service, because we know that they're 15 facing some service cuts, as well as convince the 16 private operator to do this detour. Some Congestion 17 Mitigation Air Quality Funds or SEMAC Funds could be 18 pursued to provide both additional service on 19 existing bus routes or even a dedicated shuttle 20 service either to Journal Square or to Exchange 21 Place, which would help compliment the existing 22 service that travels north/south near the site. 23 And just one other note on that, we worked 24 with the Hudson County architect to insure that bus 25 stops would be provided at the site both the roads - 15 - 1 passing by Hudson County Plaza essentially travel 2 uphill and they are going to be separated entrances 3 for the various departments in the building. So we 4 made sure that the architect was able to include in 5 their site plans bus stops at both the bottom of the 6 hill and the top of the hill that would facilitate 7 two-way transit traffic. 8 And finally, we were asked to take a 9 special look at Exchange Place, both on behalf of 10 Jersey City as well as New Jersey Transit and the 11 bus operators. Following the closure sometime, I 12 believe, in 2005 of the Exchange Place bus loop 13 which has led to some operational concerns, some 14 conflicts with traffic crossing and the light rail 15 tracks at Montgomery Street and Hudson Street in 16 Jersey City. So what we did was take a quick look 17 at the area and come up with some operational 18 alternatives that we could provide that were fairly 19 easy to implement. Looked at the area and just 20 decided where we could move a few bus stops to focus 21 more on right turns, because this is very important 22 transit hub that we want to maintain, the connection 23 between the many bus routes, the path system, the 24 light rail, the ferries and all the employers in the 25 area of Exchange Place. So we've offered in our - 16 - 1 report some recommendations for re-routing the buses 2 yet maintaining Exchange Place as a viable transit 3 hub. 4 So just to wrap up, our study has focused 5 on areas with the highest transit ridership looking 6 to really get the best bang for the buck throughout 7 the county of where most people are riding buses. 8 We've engaged the public and stakeholders throughout 9 and have gotten a lot of good feedback from both bus 10 riders as well as representatives from each 11 municipality and we believe we have developed some 12 practical and feasible solutions. 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you, 14 Chris. Thank you very much. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 16 are there any questions for Mr. Henry? 17 MR. FITZGIBBONS: I have a few. 18 My town -- where I live, does not permit the shuttle 19 buses in so far as commercial use, you know, picking 20 up passengers. Does the state have any regulations, 21 you know, to regulate the people -- the companies? 22 Are there special licenses for these buses? 23 MR. HENRY: What we found to be 24 the biggest problem is the fact that many of these 25 companies apply for interstate operating authority. - 17 - 1 And that's federal interstate, there's the state 2 licenses. The New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission 3 technically is a licensing authority for these 4 services in New Jersey. However, an operator who 5 has interstate authority, which is fairly easy to 6 obtain, is essentially beyond the control, from what 7 we understand from a legal perspective, of the state 8 or an individual municipality. And what we're not 9 only seeing is that most of these operators have 10 interstate authority but they might not actually be 11 going into New York. Some operators do go through 12 the tunnels; serve the Port Authority bus terminal 13 in Manhattan. Some, we found, essentially turn 14 around at Journal Square or maybe operate one or two 15 trips through the tunnel to, kind of, skate by with 16 the interstate authority but they're essentially 17 operating local service. But from a legal 18 perspective it's been a challenge and we've heard 19 this from the Hudson County Prosecutor as well, to 20 adequately restrict or control specific operations 21 of a company that has this interstate authority, 22 which essentially trumps the local or state 23 operating authority. 24 MR. FITZGIBBONS: But if a 25 company is using our roads and all, do they have - 18 - 1 to -- don't they have to go through our inspection 2 procedures if that vehicle was -- 3 MR. HENRY: They do and I believe the 4 larger companies -- New Jersey Motor Vehicles -- the 5 MVC again does arrange for inspections on a regular 6 basis. Clearly there's a disconnect between keeping 7 track of all these operators or a company might have 8 a fleet registered of a hundred vehicles but they 9 might actually have 150 out there. So the 10 inspections aren't going as far as they should, even 11 if on paper the intent is there to track each of 12 these vehicles. 13 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: What 14 type of license do they have to have? 15 MR. HENRY: The operator or the 16 driver specifically? 17 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: The 18 driver. 19 MR. HENRY: If the vehicle is 20 small enough, up to about a fifteen or so passenger 21 van, no special license. A large enough vehicle 22 will warrant a commercial driver's license, a CDL, 23 but many of these vans are fairly small and don't 24 actually require a special licensing. So it's very 25 easy for a driver to get -- to lease a vehicle for a - 19 - 1 day or for a month or whatever period of time and be 2 out there on the road without formal training, 3 without enough oversight from a company level and 4 certainly without enough oversight from the state 5 level. 6 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: We're 7 going to run into a problem with New York City as a 8 zone free traffic congestion, a law the they're 9 going to pass and they're going to raise the rates 10 and all. And mass transit -- and the governor said 11 it, that they might not be able to handle the new 12 commuters from this. 13 MR. HENRY: And again, I would 14 just underscore that our intent with this study is 15 not to eliminate the jitney services, but to better 16 understand who is operating what and how they can be 17 regulated to make them a viable component of the 18 transit system rather than the problem that they're 19 seen as today. 20 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Well, 21 I'm going to tell you something, ever get behind one 22 of those guys? Did you ever drive and get behind 23 one of those guys? 24 MR. HENRY: Yes. 25 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: They - 20 - 1 pull all over to pull out, I mean -- I mean, you 2 have to do more regulation. There has to be heavy 3 code enforcement on one of those vehicles. They 4 have to be ticketed. They have to make sure they 5 have the proper -- I mean, this is -- this is a big 6 problem, big problem. So I hope you -- this could 7 solve some of it. 8 MR. HENRY: We hope so too. 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 10 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 11 at this point I believe each commissioner was given 12 a copy of the final draft of the Urbitran study. If 13 over the next thirty days, between now and the July 14 meeting, if you could take a look at it. If you 15 have any comments we will certainly incorporate that 16 into the record. And if the board would entertain a 17 motion to approve it at the July meeting I think 18 that would be appropriate. And then forward it to 19 the Freeholder board for their consideration. 20 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 21 Sounds good. 22 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Mr. 23 Chairman, I just have one question. In terms of 24 timetable and implementing some of these 25 improvements, is that on the study or do we have to - 21 - 1 obtain funding to do that? 2 MR. HENRY: We're structuring 3 the study in such a way that as we get final 4 feedback from our technical advisory committee and 5 so forth, and we rank the recommendations that we've 6 offered they will have an estimated price ranking, 7 essentially as I said before, in order of both 8 feasibility and maximum impact. And we will assign 9 a general time frame to that. Some of the 10 recommendations are nothing more than paint on the 11 street, others are more involved and more complex 12 that would require either further study or 13 additional funding. 14 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Is 15 funding already in place for that or we'll have to 16 obtain funding? 17 MR. HENRY: I'm sorry? 18 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Is funding 19 already in place to implement these suggestions or 20 do we have to obtain -- 21 SECRETARY MARKS: That would be 22 subject -- Mr. Chairman, that would be subject to 23 funding opportunities from both the New Jersey 24 Department of Transportation as well as the North 25 Jersey Transportation Planning Authority, NJTPA, - 22 - 1 makes money available for improvements such as this 2 either through the Congestion Mitigation Air Quality 3 Funding, CMAQ, or through the -- it's not local 4 scoping, but another pot of money that they make 5 available. 6 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 7 Any other questions, commissioners? Thank you, 8 Chris. And we'll -- do we need a motion for the 9 next meeting or no? 10 SECRETARY MARKS: Well, if we 11 could put it on the agenda for the next meeting to 12 have an endorsement. 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: This way the 14 rest of the commissioners can review it. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Right. 16 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 17 Thank you. 18 MR. PASSAN: Can the public say 19 something about this -- may I ask a question? 20 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: About this 21 presentation? Surely. Before you start, sir, as I 22 mentioned earlier I'm going to need you say your 23 name clear for the court stenographer. We do have a 24 very lengthy agenda tonight. We have four -- 25 MR. PASSAN: I'll be brief. - 23 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: No, I know. I 2 just want to make a statement to everyone else in 3 the room. Since we have fourteen applications, we 4 are going to limit the time per application to five 5 minutes for the public speaking part. There's a 6 great deal of people here and there's a great deal 7 of applications. All right? Okay. 8 MR. PASSAN: My name is Sam 9 Passan. I wrote to the Urbitran people to make the 10 point that at this time there's no bus service to 11 Liberty State Park which is an outrage. My late 12 father is the father of Liberty State Park, Morris 13 Passan. For years he worked to get bus service to 14 the park. There -- the only way to get to the park 15 is by light rail or by driving. Coach USA used to 16 have the bus 231 that would go from the Heights -- 17 the square down Rose Street to the park. So I urge 18 the county, urge the Urbitran people to do 19 everything they can. Coach USA, I think, is the 20 biggest bus company in the world. I think they owe 21 it to this community to get people to the urban 22 state park that we all love so much and especially 23 senior citizens and everyone's stuck in their homes, 24 summer weekend, people need access to Liberty State 25 Park. And also, I'm working now in the Hamilton - 24 - 1 Park neighborhood. There's no bus that goes to 2 Hamilton Park area in Jersey City. So I hope 3 something can be done about that. Okay. Thank you 4 very much. 5 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 6 MS. GRIMM: Katherine Grimm. I 7 am in agreement with Sam about the bus to Liberty 8 State Park. And also along Carfield Avenue, as I 9 understand it, there's no longer any bus 10 transportation along Carfield Avenue which puts a 11 hindrance on the workers that are down in the 12 industrial area down around Liberty State Park and 13 Lynden Avenue. And I also feel there should be a 14 total comprehensive traffic study of all traffic in 15 and out of the area coming in from New York, from 16 Route 3 into the tunnels and how it flows in and out 17 of the municipalities. Until then I don't think we 18 can really push for mass transit unless we know how 19 the flow is and how to alleviate the congestion. 20 And also with these shuttle buses, that they have 21 hybrid buses now that they're putting on the -- that 22 are being manufactured. And if there's some way of 23 mandating that these buses be hybrids so that 24 there's less pollution in this area, which is number 25 one in pollution in the state. Thank you. - 25 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 2 MS. SCARGA: Mia Scarga, 89 3 Mercer Street. I'll be very brief. I'm a big user 4 of the jitney buses and have written various letters 5 to the editor supporting them. I live downtown, as 6 a matter of fact that's how I got here tonight and 7 how I go everywhere. I think they are tremendous 8 asset because on the 2000 census forty percent of 9 the residents of Jersey City do not own a car, I'm 10 one of them. Okay. And that percentage will 11 probably go higher. One recommendation I've made to 12 the SID on Central Avenue, I -- you know, I'm here 13 twenty-four years. I use doctors all over the place 14 and it's always predicated on their location to mass 15 transit. Half my doctors are around Crest Hospital. 16 I've used doctors on Central Avenue. And I said to 17 them, why do they all have to go down Palisade 18 Avenue. Now it's fabulous that I can -- I can catch 19 wait five minutes if I could catch one to go down 20 Central Avenue because it's a long walk from 21 Palisade to Central Avenue. I used to go to a 22 podiatrist there and I changed and go to one now at 23 St. John's. It was too long of a walk. And a lot 24 of other people feel the same way. You could 25 encourage more business for Central Avenue by - 26 - 1 dividing the route instead of everybody going down 2 Palisade Avenue. And sometimes I'm on those jitneys 3 and there's only two, three, four people, that's 4 still two, three, four cars that are off the street. 5 And coming up to a place like this during the day, 6 there's no parking. So I would encourage you to 7 consider adding more routes and having fewer of them 8 going down Palisade Avenue. Thank you very much. 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Just so 10 everyone knows, we're not regulating. This is just 11 in the preliminary stages. This is a presentation 12 of how we can make it better down the road. 13 MS. SCARGA: Well, that's what 14 the considerations is, is to expand it. Because 15 I've read the letters where people said take them 16 out, take them out. So what are you going to do, 17 add more cars when there isn't enough -- there's too 18 much traffic to begin with. So they do provide a 19 major service to the community and it could be much 20 better then they are by expanding the routes. Thank 21 you. 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 23 Thank you. Thank you, Chris. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 25 at this point in the agenda it's time for the - 27 - 1 memorialization of resolutions approved of last 2 meeting. Beginning with the MSMP-04 Township of 3 North Bergen, Municipal Stormwater Management Plan 4 for North Bergen; SP-103-06, Vito Lanzone, Jr., 5 located at 2109-2127 Kennedy Boulevard in North 6 Bergen; SP-01-07, Liberty Park at Union City, LLC, 7 located at 38th Street and Hackensack Plank Road in 8 Union City and application SP-03-07 Dublin 9 Properties, LLC, located at 9255-9271 Kennedy 10 Boulevard in North Bergen. Do I have a motion? 11 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'll 12 make a motion. 13 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Second. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 15 on a motion made by Commissioner Bettinger seconded 16 by Commissioner Avagliano, Commissioner Arencibia? 17 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 19 Avagliano? Commissioner Bettinger? 20 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 21 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 22 DeDomenico -- I'm sorry, DeDomenico is not here. 23 Commissioner Fitzgibbons? 24 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner - 28 - 1 Holloway? 2 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 3 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 4 Commissioner Mehta has -- let the record reflect 5 that Commissioner Mehta is present. Commissioner 6 Mehta? 7 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Abstain. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 9 NG? 10 COMMISSONER NG: Aye. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 12 Choffo? 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote Aye. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 15 the motion passed. Mr. Chairman, the next section 16 is 6B, Application Declared To Be Exempt beginning 17 with SP-34-07, Patricia E. Sedegin, located at 302- 18 304 Communipaw Avenue in Jersey City; application 19 SP-35-07, NY SMSA d/b/a Verizon Wireless, located at 20 201 Broadway in Bayonne; application SP-36-07, Louis 21 Cribairo, applicant located at 3611-23 Park Avenue 22 in Union City; application SP-38-07, Hoboken YMCA 23 located at 1301 Washington Street in Hoboken and 24 application SD-41-07, Homatie Raghu located at 6-8 25 Front Street in Jersey City. Do I have a motion? - 29 - 1 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Motion. 2 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: I second 3 it. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 5 on a motion made by Commissioner Holloway, seconded 6 by Commissioner Mehta, Commissioner Arencibia? 7 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 9 Avagliano? 10 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 12 Bettinger? 13 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 15 Fitzgibbons? 16 COMMISSONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 18 Holloway? 19 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 21 Mehta? 22 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 24 NG? 25 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. - 30 - 1 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 2 Choffo? 3 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 5 the motion passed. Mr. Chairman, the next section 6 to be considered it 6C on the agenda, Site Plans and 7 Subdivisions Scheduled for a Public Hearing. 8 Beginning with application SD/SP-100-06, Felipe O. 9 Neyra, located at 4108-4110 and 4114 Kennedy 10 Boulevard in Union City. 11 MR. IZQUIERDO: Good evening 12 members of the board. My name is Jose Izquierdo. 13 I'm entering my appearance for the record. I'm an 14 attorney at law. I'm also the architect for the 15 application. This is an application. It's the site 16 plan approval -- 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Excuse me one 18 second, sir. I'm sorry. 19 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Mr. Jose 20 Izquierdo is representing me in a different case 21 which has nothing to do with this case. But because 22 of that I will excuse myself from this. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you 24 Commissioner Mehta. 25 MR. IZQUIERDO: Thank you, Mr. - 31 - 1 Mehta. This is an application for site plan 2 approval and subdivision. This board gains 3 jurisdiction of the application because it's located 4 on a county road. The Zoning Board of Adjustment of 5 the City of Union City approved a three-family house 6 raised on top of a parking garage consisting of 7 three vehicles on July 27, 2006 and it was 8 memorialized on November -- on September 24, 2006. 9 The property is twenty-five by a hundred. All the 10 side yards, front yards and everything have been 11 approved by the board. It's a dual application. 12 The applicant presents itself before the case 13 besides that approval, that issues which have been 14 addressed and, I believe, that the county engineer 15 has been satisfied in terms of the sewer, the county 16 road opening permit. The applicant agrees to follow 17 and obtain all necessary municipal and county 18 approvals. The subdivision is basically a paper 19 subdivision since the property at 4108-4410, which 20 is building used for the sale of cars and mechanic 21 shop will remain as is. The property at 4114 22 presently used as a used car sales lot will be 23 converted to a two-family -- to a three-family house 24 with three parking spaces. I have nothing further. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Is the - 32 - 1 applicant's architect or engineer here to show the 2 board -- 3 MR. IZQUIERDO: I am the 4 architect. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: All right. 6 MR. IZQUIERDO: I am the 7 architect as well as the attorney. And actually the 8 applicant was downstairs. But he had a case of acid 9 reflux in the stomach. I gave him a Tagament and I 10 sent him home. I told him it was not necessary for 11 him to be here. He owns this property with his 12 wife. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Do you have 14 anything that you could show the board? 15 MR. IZQUIERDO: In terms of 16 drawings? 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Correct. 18 MR. IZQUIERDO: Oh, yes. We 19 have filed drawings with, I believe, Medina 20 Consulting Engineers and we have been through with 21 (indiscernible) in terms of the sewer manholes, the 22 connection to that. We will not be disturbing the 23 county road because actually as per the -- favorably 24 to the applicant, there is a sanitary and a storm 25 sewer line that flows underneath the sidewalk. So - 33 - 1 we will be able to connect the sanitary and the 2 storm line right underneath the sidewalk. We will 3 not need to cross Kennedy Boulevard at 42nd Street 4 which is right across Town Hall in North Bergen. 5 But yes, I do have drawings and I do have letters 6 and everything addressing all the constraints and 7 the applicant has fully complied with everything. 8 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 9 Because you've been in front of this board before, 10 right Mr. Izquierdo? 11 MR. IZQUIERDO: Yes, I have. 12 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 13 Usually the presentation -- usually the presentation 14 some of the board members would like to see a visual 15 of what's taking place in terms of what we're voting 16 on. 17 MR. IZQUIERDO: I can present 18 this specifically for the board. These are the 19 reduced eleven by seventeen drawings it's for a 20 three-family house. All the buildings to my right 21 and all the buildings to my left are the same 22 height. And I'm basically eliminating a used car 23 lot -- 24 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 25 MR. IZQUIERDO: -- which sells - 34 - 1 used cars. I'll get these two you. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Can we just -- 3 you can just pass that around so the board members 4 could see it before we vote on it. And Commissioner 5 Arencibia, do you have any questions on this? 6 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: I 7 believe the Medina Consultants reviewed the plans 8 and the applicant has addressed all of the 9 questions. 10 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Mr. Reimon? 11 MR. REIMON: Edward Reimon from 12 Medina Consultants. We've been through three rounds 13 of reviews for this site plan and they have, 14 actually, addressed all the comments that we issued 15 for this application, including the reduction of 16 number of cars inside the building. Initially they 17 had five cars and we made them go down to three just 18 because it's a three-family home. Also they have, 19 as he mentioned, he addressed the issue of tying 20 into the existing sewer line that is under the 21 sidewalk. That is actually under the jurisdiction 22 of North Alston Municipality -- I'm sorry, it's not 23 under the jurisdiction of the county. 24 I have the full-sized drawings 25 and also the full-size drawings were supplied to - 35 - 1 Steve Marks. 2 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: I have a 3 question. Some of the vehicles (indiscernible) what 4 vehicles, are they underneath the homes or are they 5 outside? 6 MR. IZQUIERDO: No, no, no. 7 They're -- what we're intending to do is have three 8 levels of apartment, all three three-bedrooms each 9 with a car -- it's not your typical two-family home 10 that you have an illegal apartment behind the 11 garage. Everything is raised on to a steel 12 structure (indiscernible) and then the parking is 13 underneath and the apartments are on top. 14 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: My 15 concern is, are they able to turn around inside or 16 do they have to back out? 17 MR. IZQUIERDO: Yes, that's why 18 we reduced the number of vehicles, yes. 19 MR. REIMON: The number of 20 vehicles was reduced because five cars could not 21 really get around and come out. Now three vehicles 22 are going -- are not going to turn around either. 23 What they're going to do is, they're going to back 24 out. But it's a better traffic circulation in and 25 out then having five cars inside the garage. - 36 - 1 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: I 2 understand that but -- 3 MR. REIMON: So it's going to -- 4 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: I 5 understand that but that's a serious problem, 6 backing out of that driveway. They should be able 7 to turn around. 8 MR. REIMON: There is no problem 9 for a (indiscernible). You don't have enough 10 width -- 11 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: You 12 don't have enough width. 13 MR. REIMON: -- to provide a K 14 turn. This is (indiscernible) typical one, two or 15 three family house that has a driveway and just a 16 space to put a space in the garage. 17 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: What is 18 the street that they are coming out on, Mr. 19 Chairman? 20 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Kennedy 21 Boulevard. 22 MR. REIMON: It's coming out to 23 Kennedy Boulevard. 24 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Oh no, 25 that's bad. - 37 - 1 MR. REIMON: The only reason why 2 is -- we don't believe it's going to be such a 3 (indiscernible) to the traffic on Kennedy Boulevard 4 is because the location of the driveway has enough 5 (indiscernible) because it's between two traffic 6 signals. 7 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Do you 8 have a bigger diagram to show us? 9 MR. REIMON: Yes. 10 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Can we 11 see that. 12 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: I 13 have a question. You say the buildings surrounding 14 is the same height. Are there other buildings there 15 that have parking underneath? 16 MR. REIMON: The existing site 17 is a used car sales -- 18 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: That 19 had parking. 20 MR. REIMON: -- and vehicles 21 come in and out. The reason that the -- that the 22 county engineer has sided with the application, I 23 don't believe, having spoken with him, is because 24 it's going to have a three-family house and the 25 traffic is going to be very little. You're going to - 38 - 1 have a car come in, you know, in the evening when 2 you come back home from work and you'll stay home. 3 And it's located between 42nd and 41st Street, both 4 within traffic signals. We're trying to make a bad 5 situation better. That's why the engineer asked me 6 to reduce from five parking spaces to three parking 7 spaces giving them one parking space for every unit. 8 There are a number of two-family 9 homes located on Kennedy Boulevard, along Jersey 10 City and whatnot. It's a twenty-five by a hundred 11 lot -- 12 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Excuse me one 13 second. Commissioner (indiscernible) is the 14 applicant saying there's hundreds of single family 15 and two-family homes with driveways on Kennedy 16 Boulevard that back out. And that's not really an 17 issue. It would be an issue if it was a used car 18 lot backing out very often, but it's not going to be 19 a safety issue since it's only a -- you know, one or 20 two times a day it may happen. 21 MR. SPEAKER: And Mr. Izquierdo, 22 did you receive Union City's approval for this? 23 MR. IZQUIERDO: Yes. Yes, I do 24 and I have filed that approval. The resolution -- 25 it was actually approved at the meeting of July 27, - 39 - 1 2006 and it was memorialized on September 14, 2006. 2 I believe that Steven Marks has a copy of that 3 application we had filed together with 4 (indiscernible). 5 MR. FITZGIBBONS: I have another 6 question. Is the North Hudson Sewage Authority, did 7 they approve the connecting the sewer lines? 8 MR. IZQUIERDO: I haven't made 9 (indiscernible) connection to the sewer because I 10 have to receive planning board approvals before I 11 continue further with the project. My first step 12 was receiving approval from the Zoning Board of 13 Adjustments of the City of Union City, which I did. 14 And then the second step is Hudson County Planning 15 Board approval. After this it is the applicant's 16 burden to receive all other approvals. As Mr. 17 Reimon has indicated that because the sewer line 18 runs underneath the sidewalk we won't have to cut 19 into Kennedy Boulevard. We won't be disturbing 20 traffic and we will just be connecting underneath 21 the sidewalk, have I misspoken? 22 MR. REIMON: Yeah. Not only 23 that, you are not actually impacting any county 24 sewer line. We have (indiscernible). 25 MR. SPEAKER: That's what I was - 40 - 1 saying I want to add, Mr. Chairman, it was a detail 2 for the concrete curb. It says nine by sixteen. It 3 should be a nine by eighteen curb. 4 MR. IZQUIERDO: Not a problem. 5 MR. SPEAKER: And the county is 6 going to plan on resurfacing the roadway within the 7 next six months. So if you do have any road opening 8 cuts you should do them as soon as possible. 9 MR. REIMON: In reference to 10 that, should it be a combination between him and 11 your office before they actually try to do something 12 else to see if the sidewalk and the curb could be 13 (indiscernible) sidewalk and curb right now on 14 Kennedy Boulevard. 15 MR. SPEAKER: It's brand new. 16 MR. REIMON: What -- we need to 17 do curb and sidewalk because you are disturbing the 18 sidewalk to install the new lines. 19 MR. IZQUIERDO: Agreed. 20 MR. REIMON: So what I'm saying 21 is that since you're going to be disturbing the curb 22 and sidewalk at the same time the county is doing 23 curb and sidewalk, we think those limits. As it is 24 appropriate that you talk to the county to see if 25 instead of you doing the sidewalk and the curb you - 41 - 1 can actually continue in Morris County. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Well, it would 3 be the other way around. We would just skip this 4 area until he is ready to come in and do it. We 5 just don't know if he ever will do it until he gets 6 approval so -- 7 MR. SPEAKER: We don't want to 8 resurface it and then have to rip it back up to run 9 the utility lines. 10 MR. REIMON: What I'm saying is, 11 if we put the money down -- 12 MR. SPEAKER: It's a little 13 complicated. I think the best thing is -- the 14 county will proceed in its project (indiscernible) 15 and that's it. 16 MR. REIMON: I agree with you. 17 Actually, what happened is since the property is now 18 presently used as a used car sales lot we already 19 have a curb done. So we will not have to disturb 20 the curb and the work that the county has done. 21 What we will have to do at the time that we file for 22 the permit is break the sidewalk, without the curb, 23 and then connect to the storm and the sanitary sewer 24 and then replace the curb. And we will place 25 whatever bond -- performance bond, labor and - 42 - 1 materials that will be required by the county. We 2 have no problem with the (indiscernible). 3 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Okay. Any 4 other questions? Do I have a motion? 5 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: I 6 make a motion. 7 COMMISSIONER NG: Second. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 9 on a motion to approve the application made by 10 Commissioner Fitzgibbons seconded by Commissioner 11 Ng. Commissioner Arencibia? 12 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 14 Avagliano? 15 COMMISSONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 17 Bettinger? 18 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 20 Fitzgibbons? 21 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 23 Holloway? 24 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner - 43 - 1 Mehta? Actually he abstained. Commissioner Ng? 2 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 3 SECRETARY MARKS: And Chairman 4 Choffo? 5 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 7 the motion passed. 8 MR. IZQUIERDO: Thank you very 9 much. I will leave the subdivision deeds and the 10 deeds with Stephen Marks for them to be executed and 11 memorialized at the next hearing. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 13 Actually Mr. Chairman, for Commissioner Mehta it 14 should be not present, not abstain, he actually 15 recused himself. 16 Mr. Chairman, the next 17 application scheduled for public hearing is SD-19- 18 07, 317 Jersey Avenue LLC, located at 6th Street, 19 which is block 317.5, lot 50A in Jersey City. 20 MR. ALAMPI: Good evening, Mr. 21 Chairman, members of the board. For the record my 22 name is Carmine Alumni, ALAMPI. I'm with the firm 23 of Alampi and DeMarrais in Hackensack. And I 24 represent the applicant 317 Jersey Avenue, LLC. We 25 are actually representing four distinct - 44 - 1 (indiscernible) companies on your agenda this 2 evening. They are also 280 Erie Street, 389 3 Monmouth Street, LLC, and 354 Coles Street, LLC. 4 We filed four distinct and 5 separate applications for county approval of 6 subdivision and each of these parcels are very much 7 identical one with the other but it is proper that 8 we file four separate applications. 9 What I intend to do this evening 10 is to present the first application in great detail, 11 with regard to the subdivision, and although you do 12 not have a site plan review within the scope of this 13 review, since we have already secured site plan 14 approval, we have an architect that we're going to 15 give you a brief exhibition of what we plan to do on 16 the site, because I think you like to have a little 17 context. Clearly the application is a subdivision 18 application. We are building two-family housing and 19 we want to show it to you. 20 The presentation, if I do it 21 this way, it will narrow us then to keep the witness 22 (indiscernible) particulars of each of the LLC 23 applications. Unless you wish for me to go through 24 each application in brief detail each time. But it 25 becomes very redundant but it's up to you. - 45 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: It's going to 2 be the same presentation? 3 MR. ALAMPI: It will be the same 4 witnesses, presentation. The properties are of 5 equal size. One or two small exceptions which we'll 6 point out to you. They're all the same type of 7 application. 8 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: For the record 9 and for voting purposes we will treat them 10 separately when it comes time for that. But Mr. 11 Calvanico? 12 MR. CALVANICO: I don't see any 13 reason why we couldn't do that. 14 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 15 MR. ALAMPI: I also would like 16 to bring to the board's attention that this property 17 is in the ownership of the eight different 18 (indiscernible) liabilities of my company -- of my 19 client. So we're only presenting the four 20 applications that we've identified, Jersey, Eerie, 21 Monmouth and Coles. I know that this 22 (indiscernible) because the audience is here. But 23 this is the property that has been commonly referred 24 to as the 6th Street (indiscernible). And for a 25 brief overview I'd like to have (indiscernible) - 46 - 1 former Conwell Property that ran from the 2 (indiscernible) branch in Jersey City and has long 3 been discontinued and abandoned. 4 There are, presently, a number 5 of lawsuits that are filed. One with the federal 6 government, surface transportation board and several 7 others in the superior court. But in dealing with 8 different aspects of the case. But one aspect of 9 the case that hasn't been finalized is the decision 10 of the court to bring subdivision that is a major 11 subdivision, and preliminary site plan approval on 12 these four parcels. I have attached to the exhibit 13 package and to my application the court order of 14 Judge Allen Holden that was issued last year. And 15 that court order erroneously referred to final site 16 plan approval when it was preliminary site plan 17 approval. So it was corrected in October. It was 18 first entered in August of 2006 and corrected by the 19 judge when I brought it to his attention in October 20 of 2006. 21 That court litigation was a 22 result of a series of public hearings and 23 (indiscernible). And what it says to you is that 24 the City of Jersey City through its planning 25 commission and planning board by implementation of - 47 - 1 the Court, has granted major subdivision and a 2 preliminary filing of site plan -- preliminary site 3 plan approval to these parcels. We're here today to 4 finalize the subdivision already granted by court 5 order. With that, I have witnesses from the Shore 6 Department, our engineering firm. And then we'll 7 have Dean (indiscernible) -- Dean Marchetto 8 (phonetic), our architect who will give a 9 presentation on the use of the property. 10 Chairman, I should also note 11 that when we submitted the application we attached 12 the court orders but we did send another copy to 13 Mr. Marks for his review. I know he wanted to study 14 the effect of those court orders. And I am aware 15 that the County of Hudson does have a county-wide, I 16 guess, parks master plan and it does have an 17 historic preservation and open space trust fund and 18 a (indiscernible) space historic preservation 19 implementation plan. I'm aware of that. 20 And I'm also aware, and I 21 know the board is aware and I know the public is 22 aware, that at some time in March of 2005 your 23 Freeholder group did pass a resolution implementing 24 this plan. And in so implementing it included our 25 property as one of these properties identified for - 48 - 1 acquisition. So we are aware that the county, just 2 like the City of Jersey City and other agencies, 3 might secure funding of some type and may obtain the 4 acquisition of this property. That's for another 5 day and another forum and another litigation. At 6 this time, my clients are the owners of this 7 property, are seeking development of this property 8 and have achieved successful review of these 9 applications both at the municipal level and at the 10 county level, in one aspect, and at the state court 11 level. 12 You might recall that I was here 13 last year for a property called Brunswick Street, 14 LLC; 1415 Brunswick Street is part of this section 15 of properties. We appeared before this county board 16 and received subdivision approval after we had 17 received subdivision approval from the City of 18 Jersey City. That property is property that is at 19 grade and does not have what we call the embankment 20 walls on it. The embankment is a structure of walls 21 that are anywhere from fifteen feet to twenty-five 22 feet or so in height that used to house the railroad 23 tracks for the railroad to run over the top of them, 24 alongside 6th Street. So these properties do have 25 the embankment walls situated on them. - 49 - 1 We have filed an 2 application with the City of Jersey City for review 3 of a demolition permit and we have filed a 4 certificate of appropriateness and hardship 5 application to go through the process that the law 6 requires us to go through in order to seek 7 permission for the removal of the wall. The 8 jurisdiction for that issue, the integrity or the 9 removal of the wall lies with, initially, the 10 Historic Preservation Commission of the City of 11 Jersey City. Ultimately, to the Board of Adjustment 12 and then if it's satisfied, ultimately with the 13 Superior Court. That is not before you. 14 What is before you is our 15 request for subdivision approval. With that I'll 16 call our first witness. 17 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Can you swear 18 him in first. 19 MR. CAVANICO: Yes. Please 20 state your name and spell your last name for the 21 record. 22 MR. REMICK: Adam Remick, R-E-M- 23 I-C-K. 24 MR. CALVANICO: Thank you. 25 (Witness is duly sworn) - 50 - 1 MR. CALVANICO: The witness has 2 been sworn, Mr. Chairman. 3 MR. ALAMPI: Thank you. Mr. 4 Remick, can you please give the board the benefit of 5 your educational background and you're licensing and 6 your professional (indiscernible)? 7 MR. REMICK: Certainly. I 8 attended the University Institute of Technology and 9 received a Bachelor's of Science Degree in the field 10 of Civil Engineering. I am licensed in the State of 11 New Jersey as a Civil Engineer. I am a senior 12 project manager with the firm of Schoor DePalma. 13 I've been with that firm for over two and a half 14 years and have been practicing in field of civil 15 engineering for over ten years. 16 I have been qualified as a 17 professional witness in the field of civil 18 engineering in front of numerous planning boards and 19 boards of adjustment in Northern New Jersey as well 20 as in the Passaic court as a certified civil 21 engineer. 22 MR. ALAMPI: Mr. Chairman, will 23 you accept the credentials of our engineering 24 witness? 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Yes, we will. - 51 - 1 MR. ALAMPI: Thank you. Now 2 Adam, with regard to the subdivision application, 3 did you supervise and participate in the preparation 4 of these plans that are submitted to the board? 5 MR. REMICK: Yes, I did. 6 MR. ALAMPI: And these are the 7 final plans that were revised as of March 30, 2007 8 and submitted to the board as a resubmission on 9 April 11, 2007? 10 MR. REMICK: That is correct. 11 MR. ALAMPI: And how many 12 exhibits do you have for the 317 Jersey Avenue 13 application? 14 MR. REMICK: At this time I had 15 only planned on presenting one exhibit on the plan, 16 the major subdivision plan. It gives a nice 17 overview of the project. 18 MR. ALAMPI: And maybe you 19 can -- will this pick him up if he stands by the 20 plans? 21 MR. SPEAKER: (Indiscernible). 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you, Mr. 23 Marchetto. 24 MR. ALAMPI: Thank you. 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Can you bring - 52 - 1 the plans up (indiscernible) so we can see them a 2 little better? You've done that before Dean, huh? 3 MR. ALAMPI: What do we call 4 this plan? 5 MR. REMICK: The plan I'll be 6 discussing is entitled the Final Subdivision Plan 7 for 317 Jersey Avenue, LLC. It is dated 10/21/05, 8 bearing no revision dates and it is one of one. 9 MR. ALAMPI: And just tell us a 10 little bit about the property, its location and the 11 overall dimensions of the property. 12 MR. REMICK: The property is 13 known as block 317.5, lot 50A on the tax maps of 14 Jersey City. It is approximately one half of a 15 block that is bounded by 6th Street on the northerly 16 side and by Coles Street on the westerly side and 17 Jersey Avenue on the easterly side. The southerly 18 side is comprised of other lots that are not under 19 the control of my applicant -- not under the 20 ownership of my applicant. The property is 21 approximately 400 feet in width along 6th Street and 22 one hundred feet deep. It contains approximately 23 0.92 acres in total, prior to subdivision. 24 We are proposing to subdivide 25 this property into sixteen lots, each twenty-five - 53 - 1 foot in width with the exception of the easterly 2 most lot which is slightly larger at 26.3 feet in 3 width. And all lots are to be one hundred feet in 4 depth. These lots are within the R-1 zone district 5 within the City of Jersey City. And this zone 6 district requires a minimum lot area of 2,500 square 7 feet. Each of which lot, at twenty-five by one 8 hundred feet or somewhat larger at 26.3 by one 9 hundred, meet that requirement. 10 In addition, it is required that 11 these lots have a minimum lot width of twenty-five 12 feet and a minimum lot depth of one hundred feet. 13 Each of these lots is fully in conformance with 14 those zoning regulations. 15 MR. ALAMPI: Thank you. Are 16 there any other features to the subdivision that 17 deal with topography or any of those issues? 18 MR. REMICK: Not dealing with 19 the subdivision. The subdivision is a legal 20 subdivision and is not impacted by the topography of 21 the site. There is an easement that is along the 22 southerly portion. It runs in an east/west 23 direction to provide for an access alleyway along 24 the rear of the property. 25 MR. ALAMPI: And that access - 54 - 1 alleyway will be preserved, correct? 2 MR. REMICK: That is correct. 3 In fact as part of this application we are going to 4 enlarge that alleyway easement. It currently exists 5 at a ten foot width, five foot of which is on the 6 subject property, five foot of which is on the 7 adjoining properties. We are proposing to enlarge 8 that by adding to make it a total of twenty foot in 9 width. So it would be fifteen feet on the subject 10 property. 11 MR. ALAMPI: And is any part of 12 this property at or within 200 feet of any county 13 roadway, abutting any county roadway or any county 14 drainage facility? 15 MR. REMICK: No, it is not. 16 MR. ALAMPI: Are there any other 17 features of the zoning schedule, at the top of the 18 exhibit that you would like to emphasize? 19 MR. REMICK: It does specify 20 yard setbacks; however that is a feature of the site 21 plan. I would note that we do meet all of the 22 required minimum and maximum setbacks for any 23 proposed structures. 24 MR. ALAMPI: Has this plan 25 complied completely with the county's requirement - 55 - 1 for the filing of a subdivision plan? 2 MR. REMICK: I believe it has. 3 We did receive a review letter on this project. The 4 one item that I would note within that review letter 5 is, is it requested that the plans and plats shall 6 include a signature block for the county planner or 7 county engineer, which we would certainly comply 8 with. 9 MR. ALAMPI: Now the review 10 letter was initially issued on May 7, 2007? 11 MR. REMICK: That is correct. 12 MR. ALAMPI: And there was a 13 replacement letter dated June 12, 2007? 14 MR. REMICK: That is correct. 15 MR. ALAMPI: And essentially 16 this is a two-page comment, review letter by the 17 county planning department? 18 MR.REMICK: Yes. 19 MR. ALAMPI: And the only 20 comment that addresses your issue, for engineering 21 purposes, is needing the signature block -- 22 MR. REMICK: Correct. 23 MR. ALAMPI: -- as described. 24 Chairman, I have no further questions of this 25 witness. This is a fully conforming subdivision, - 56 - 1 conforming to the municipal ordinances of Jersey 2 City and conforming to the county review 3 jurisdiction for subdivisions. We do note that 4 because of the nature of this property and the fact 5 that the property was listed on a to be acquired 6 list, that you might reiterate that in your review 7 and approval. We certainly know that's part of the 8 history of the property but we don't know if that 9 will ever come to pass. But we certainly recognize 10 that its part of the review letter and if Mr. Marks 11 wants to address any item, I think we've complied 12 with the items in his review letter. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: You said you 14 sought no variances whatsoever? 15 MR. ALAMPI: No variances. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Any questions 17 commissioners? 18 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Yes, 19 Jersey City did they approve this? 20 MR. ALAMPI: they were ordered 21 to approve it. It was approved by Judge 22 (indiscernible) when they wrongfully refused to 23 approve it. I attended to those meetings. I made 24 the applications. There was no basis in law to deny 25 it. And it was determined, as a matter of law by - 57 - 1 the Superior Court. And it's the law of the -- of 2 this case. 3 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Go ahead, Mr. 4 Marks. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 6 there are a number of speakers who would like to get 7 their five minutes. Would you like the list or 8 should I read off people as they -- 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I'd like you 10 just to mention, for the record, about Mahwah 11 Township, we spoke about. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 13 I prepared a memorandum for the edification of the 14 board. I would like to reserve my comments until 15 after everybody's spoken. 16 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 17 That's fine. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Should I call 19 up the first -- 20 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: You may 21 proceed. 22 MR. ALAMPI: Mr. Chairman, I'm 23 sorry. Before you do call the public, do you want 24 to take a look at the site plan although it's not 25 part of the project; do you want Mr. Marchetto's - 58 - 1 profile on the site planning? It's not part of the 2 application. It's not necessary -- it's up to you. 3 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: I 4 think we're here to approve one thing tonight, not 5 their site plan. That's another night. 6 MR. SPEAKER: You're absolutely 7 correct. The site plan is not required. We don't 8 have to get into it -- could we just stick to -- 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Since we're -- 10 yes, I'm sorry. Since we're voting on the 11 subdivision, we'll keep it with the subdivision. 12 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Okay. 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. Go 14 ahead, Mr. Marks. You can -- 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Eric Fleming 16 from the Harsimus Cove Association President. 17 MS. SPEAKER: He had to leave. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 19 he had to leave. Jennifer Myer. 20 MS. MYER: I have some visuals. 21 MR. ALAMPI: Mr. Chairman, I'm 22 going to object to any (indiscernible) as required, 23 prior to tonight's hearing. Any matters -- any 24 applications should be on file. I'm going to raise 25 an objection to exhibits being handed in. I have no - 59 - 1 way to authenticate them. I have no way to 2 challenge how they were prepared and who prepared 3 them. With that objection on the record, you may 4 wish to overrule me and look at them anyway, but 5 that's my objection. 6 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: I've 7 got a question. What kind of visuals are they? 8 MS. MYER: What they are is, 9 they're just some basic pictures for those of you 10 who might not be familiar with the property as it is 11 today because it's actually a very unique property. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Excuse me. 13 Excuse me one second. Can you just state your name 14 once again, clearly, for the record? 15 MS. MYERS: My name is Jennifer 16 Myers. I reside at 495 Monmouth Street and I'm 17 president of the Embankment Preservation Coalition. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 19 MS. MYERS: And there's also, 20 just a conceptual plan of, you know, the park idea 21 which -- 22 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: 23 That's -- you're saying what could be there, right. 24 We want to know what's there now. 25 MS. MYERS: There's photos which - 60 - 1 shows you some different views on (indiscernible). 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 3 Before we do that I just want Mr. -- our counsel's 4 advice on this. Mr. Calvanico? 5 MR. CALVANICO: My advice to the 6 board would be to allow the documentation. We note 7 Mr. Alampi's objection for the record. We should 8 allow the documents at this point. I would ask that 9 he be allowed to view them first before -- 10 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do you have 11 additional copies you could provide a copy to Mr. 12 Alampi? 13 MS. MYERS: I wish I did. I'm 14 sorry. 15 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 16 MS. MYERS: I just wanted to 17 clarify that we had been told, you know, at the 18 Embankment Preservation Coalition and we represent, 19 you know, hundreds of people in the community and we 20 had been told that we could bring some people up to 21 talk. So we had a number of people who are just 22 going to make -- we asked them to make some points 23 which we thought were relevant. So we'll try and 24 really move quickly through this. 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. - 61 - 1 MS. MYERS: So should I just 2 make my statement? 3 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Go ahead. Mr. 4 Alampi, go ahead. 5 MR. ALAMPI: Mr. Chairman, I 6 raised the objection to these exhibits, they were 7 two-fold. And I understood your attorney's 8 recommendation. There is one exhibit which is 9 photographs that do not appear to be (indiscernible) 10 in the photographs. Although I object to them, my 11 concern that what's embellished (indiscernible). I 12 think that that's inappropriate. That the 13 photograph itself may be examined, if you weigh that 14 out. The other exhibits though appear to be 15 fabricated by either this coalition or a people in 16 conjunction with them about what could be or should 17 be. There's no scale, there are no dimensions, there 18 are no costs analysis. So I would break my 19 objection into two parts. Although I objected to 20 the photographs, if you wish to have your attorney 21 rule on the photographs you can pass them around. I 22 think it would be wrong, however, to take visuals, 23 sketches and such, that are not prepared by a 24 licensed professional, that are not scaled, about 25 what could be there because that's not there. - 62 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Uh-huh. 2 MR. ALAMPI: It's zone R-1 3 residential. With that, I'd ask your counsel, 4 maybe, to break down my objection. He may sustain, 5 you know, part of it and overrule the other part of 6 it. What I'm sticking to is the prejudicial factor 7 of looking at what might be there on private 8 property. 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I understand. 10 And I -- my comment and if any of the other 11 commissioners have a comment, they'll get to respond 12 also is that this is not going to be submitted as 13 evidence, I believe. So it's a matter of just the 14 commissioner viewing it unless -- 15 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Also, 16 as we heard in the beginning, either Jersey City or 17 the county might want to take that property over and 18 develop at -- whatever they want to do with it as 19 far as Green Acres, whatever they're going to do 20 there. So these pictures here, even though they 21 might be nice, but there might be some other ideas 22 for that space if the county takes it over. 23 MS. MYERS: Yes, absolutely. 24 And this is a concept that's based on the 25 conversations we had with the city and the scale is, - 63 - 1 you know, as described. The one hundred by 400 foot 2 lots. But you know, it's just a concept just to let 3 you know what the committee has been talking about. 4 So if you'll allow them and then I'll just make my 5 brief statement. 6 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: We'll allow 7 them. Go ahead. 8 MS. MYERS: Again. My name is 9 Jennifer Myers. I am president of the Embankment 10 Preservation Coalition. We're a non-profit. We 11 formed to preserve the Pennsylvania (indiscernible) 12 and Embankment which is the massive stone elevated 13 railway and promote its reuse as a passive park and 14 greenway. The four properties under consideration 15 for subdivision tonight are part of this rail right 16 of way. We have an organization of approximately 17 850 supporters and dues paying members. In 18 addition, dozens of non-profit organizations 19 throughout the region have endorsed our goals. 20 Thousands of county residents have signed our 21 petitions and we have called for the embankment 22 preservation and reuse of the Passive Park and 23 greenway and help the City of Jersey City raise the 24 funds to acquire the property. 25 Many members of our coalition - 64 - 1 are here tonight. They're going to give various 2 reasons why the county planning board should not 3 approve these subdivision applications, in brief. 4 The subdivision for residential development 5 conflicts with the county planning priorities, 6 anticipates the demolition of a historic structure, 7 destroys a rare habitat corridor, has a continuous 8 right of way in existence for 150 years, paves the 9 way for increasing flooding and problems in a flood 10 plane and adds to the Hudson River (indiscernible) 11 combines sewer outflows. Last but not least, the 12 City of Jersey City lead a petition before the 13 Federal Surface Transportation Board contesting sale 14 of the properties to the developers LLC without 15 first following federal rail abandonment 16 regulations. That ruling is expected shortly. 17 Isn't this putting the cart before the horse to 18 consider subdivisions before the STB rules? I ask 19 the planning board to deny the subdivisions 20 requested. Thank you. 21 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 22 Thank you. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Richard James? 24 MR. JAMES: Good evening. 25 Richard James, 49 (indiscernible) Avenue. I don't - 65 - 1 think I've figured out this microphone yet. I am 2 going to have to ask Mr. Alampi one question before 3 I begin my one minute speech. Mr. Alampi, are you 4 aware of any of the final orders which you 5 referenced in your presentation being under appeal? 6 MR. ALAMPI: The appeal has not 7 been followed, to my knowledge, as not in effect. 8 Nonetheless, Mr. Chairman, I'm not answering 9 questions. The court order stands. There's no stay 10 on the order. 11 MR. JAMES: I guess I thought I 12 had the right to ask people who made presentations 13 questions. If I've broken your rules, I apologize. 14 In any event, with good reason the site plan and 15 subdivision resolution this board is authorized to 16 enforce is silent on the entire matter of rail 17 lines. This is largely because lines of rail are 18 federally regulated. The Embankment Preservation 19 Coalition with the City of Jersey City and others 20 has petitioned the Federal Surface Transportation 21 Board alleging that this rail corridor, part of 22 which is the subject of this subdivision hearing, 23 has never been subject to the requisite federal rail 24 abandonment procedures. This federally mandated 25 procedure, by the way, constitutes a federal permit - 66 - 1 and it triggers other federal environmental and 2 cultural resource reviews. 3 The STB has accepted our 4 petition and is still studying the matter. It has 5 yet to render a decision and of course has yet to 6 impose any other number of remedies that would be a 7 consequence of that decision. Hence, a 8 (indiscernible) decision by this board would bring 9 out the regulatory authority of a higher 10 governmental authority. The STB decision might well 11 effect ownership of this property and/or impose 12 substantial restraints upon any current or future 13 private or public owner. Ultimately, this board's 14 actions must depend upon the ruling of the Surface 15 Transportation Board. We ask that your actions 16 tonight reflect this. Thank you. 17 (Applause) 18 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Peter Delman. 20 MR. DELMAN: My name is Peter Delman, 21 D-E-L-M-A-N from 263 Fifth Street. Major 22 responsibilities of the County Planning Board are to 23 prepare and adopt a master plan for the county's 24 physical development and two, to encourage municipal 25 cooperation in matters of mutual and regional - 67 - 1 concern. I ask you to deny these subdivision 2 applications because they undermine the Hudson 3 County Master Plan and Open Space Plan. The 4 municipality of Jersey City Master Plan and draft 5 Open Space Plan and Recreation Plan and the 6 endorsement of twenty-six New Jersey municipalities 7 and six county governing bodies for the route of the 8 East Coast Greenway. Thank you. 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 10 (Applause) 11 SECRETARY MARKS: John Crowley 12 Delman. 13 MR. DELMAN: John Crowley 14 Delman, 263 Fifth Street, Jersey City. Subdivision 15 of the embankment would make a mockery of the County 16 Master Plan. Here are just a few examples of the 17 dozens of general land use, circulation, community 18 facility, conservation and historic preservation 19 goals that directly conflict with subdividing this 20 historic structure and right of way. 21 First, preserve the character of 22 existing well-established neighborhoods and protect 23 them from the incompatible development. The 24 embankment runs between two national historic 25 districts and is integral to them. - 68 - 1 Second, integrate waterfront 2 development with adjacent neighborhoods by assuring 3 strong physical linkages. The embankment 4 transportation corridor runs west/east and connects 5 interior neighborhoods to new development and the 6 north/south Hudson River waterfront walkway at 6th 7 Street. 8 Third, promote transit and use 9 of alternate transportation modes. The embankment 10 is part of the route for the East Coast Greenway, a 11 walking, biking path from Maine to Florida, 12 recommended in a 2004 NJ DOT study. An NJ transit 13 study is also underway on the feasibility of using 14 part of the embankment for light rail. 15 Fourth, promote connections to 16 the Secaucus transfer station. Mayor Healy's light 17 rail proposal for part of the embankment promotes 18 this connection. 19 Fifth, preserve existing scenic 20 vistas. The embankment provides unique scenic views 21 of two national historic districts and the Hudson 22 River waterfront. 23 Finally, promote culture and 24 tourism. The East Coast Greenway is expected to 25 spurt eco-historic tourism along this route. And - 69 - 1 the embankment segment is anticipated to be a 2 destination as well as a connector. How does 3 demolition of historic structure and replacement of 4 the typical residential development meet the spirit 5 and letter of the master plan? Thank you. 6 (Applause) 7 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Christina 9 Donelly? 10 MS. DONELLY: Christina Donelly. 11 I live at 250 Fifth Street. The Hudson County Open 12 Space Plan lists the 6th Street embankment as the 13 county's priority number 3 for open space 14 acquisition. In addition, the plan recommends the 15 implementation of pedestrian and bicycle paths in 16 general and the East Coast Greenway specifically. 17 It urges building of the proposed open space shown 18 on the official green map. This map marks the 6th 19 Street embankment as a walkway, bikeway and historic 20 site. I ask you to not approve these subdivisions. 21 (Applause) 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Steven 24 Guciardi? 25 MR. GUCIARIDI: Good evening. - 70 - 1 My name is Steven Guciardi. I live at 302 Pavonia 2 Avenue. The Pennsylvania railroad (indiscernible) 3 to extend embankment is listed on the state register 4 of historic places. It's eligible for the national 5 register. It is a Jersey City municipal landmark 6 and it's one of the top ten endangered historic 7 sites listed in the 2006 -- listed in 2006 by the 8 preservation of New Jersey, the state-wide historic 9 preservation organization. We're not talking about 10 subdividing a vacant piece of land here. There is a 11 structure that exists on this property. It's been 12 acknowledged by various organizations and 13 municipalities in this state. And we're talking 14 about knocking down a landmark. We urge that you do 15 not be duplicitous in the destruction of this 16 important site. Thank you. 17 (Applause) 18 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Bob Perrot. 20 MR. PERROT: My name is Robert 21 Perrot. I live at 31 Eerie Street in downtown 22 Jersey City. This application raises a problem I 23 hope you will consider regarding this application. 24 Jersey City has a combined sewer system which mixes 25 storm water and raw sewage together. During heavy - 71 - 1 rains, combined sewer outflows or, they're called 2 CSOs, pose significant health threats to residents 3 plagued by sewer backups. High levels of 4 contaminated water are sent into the harbor estuary. 5 Now adding residential development with impermeable 6 surfaces to this already overburdened area will only 7 increase this problem while burdening tax payers 8 with costly solutions. Thank you. 9 (Applause) 10 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Dale Hartman? 12 MR. HARTMAN: Mr. Chairman and 13 commissioners, my name is Dale Hartman. I live at 14 335 3rd Street and across from (indiscernible) 15 section. And I want to basically emphasize the 16 transportation value of the embankment. Since 1857, 17 for over 150 years, the 6th Street embankment has 18 been part of a transportation corridor. It doesn't 19 make any sense for the county board of planning to 20 further approve the demise of this corridor. It was 21 already emphasized by (indiscernible) that our 22 (indiscernible) had spoke on whether it's possible 23 to develop this as a light rail corridor in the 24 future. As well as, we had spoken to you in the 25 beginning about its connection as far as a national - 72 - 1 railway allowance that stretches for 2,500 miles and 2 would bring tourists into this area from Maine to 3 Florida. Well, I suggest that you consider these 4 subdivision applications and deny all four of them. 5 Thank you. 6 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 7 (Applause) 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Claire Perrot? 9 MS. PERROT: My name is Claire 10 Perrot. I live at 31 (indiscernible) Street in 11 Jersey City and (indiscernible). 12 Initially it was though the East 13 Coast Greenway would end in New Jersey at Perth 14 Amboy because it would be too difficult to create a 15 safe walking and biking route through Hudson County. 16 It was unthinkable, however, that the state's most 17 densely populated county and second largest city 18 would not be included in this urban trail. The New 19 Jersey Department of Transportation therefore funded 20 a study that not only determined the route but with 21 the inclusion of the embankment and (indiscernible) 22 found one of the most spectacular (indiscernible) 23 along the eastern seaboard. (Indiscernible) the 24 embankment to residential development would derail 25 the route in Hudson County, a terrible disservice to - 73 - 1 its residents. 2 In addition, as I understand it, 3 Jersey City has the least green space per person of 4 any city in New Jersey. The embankment, untouched, 5 provides a corridor of green space both beautiful 6 and useful in terms of flood control between two 7 historic districts. By the way, Harsimus Cove has 8 no other green space. Both New York City and Paris 9 have had the vision to stay similar (indiscernible) 10 railroad embankments and transform them into high 11 line parks that benefit not only the neighborhood 12 but attract interest from all over. 13 Since (indiscernible) plans and 14 open space plans call for Jersey City and Hudson 15 County's acquisition of the embankment, I don't 16 understand how this railroad right of way is even 17 available for consideration of development of 18 subdivision by this board or any board to even 19 consider filing (indiscernible) on such a corridor 20 (indiscernible) houses, more people actually 21 eliminating existing valuable open space. I hope 22 that you will not approve this subdivision. 23 (Applause) 24 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Richard Meyer. - 74 - 1 MR. MEYER: My name is Richard 2 Meyer. I live at 495 9th Street in Jersey City. I 3 wanted to discuss flooding issues. This past May, 4 I'm sure you're all aware of the substantial 5 flooding that we had. And indeed my grandson 6 couldn't go to school for a week because of the 7 flooding which has been attributed by some to the 8 massive building that's going on down there. This 9 embankment is also a rain abatement, if you will. 10 It receives a great deal of water and it absorbs it 11 and will distribute it over days if not weeks. It 12 does not pour into the city and into the sewers. 13 And all (indiscernible) and looking forward to 14 sitting and (indiscernible) up there. I wish you 15 would deny this application. Thank you. 16 (Applause) 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Joanne 18 Guciardo. 19 MS. GUCIARDO: Joanne Guciardo 20 of 302 Pavonia Avenue. County plans call for 21 protection of environmentally sensitive areas. 22 Since the train stopped running the top of the 23 embankment has been naturally seeded and now 24 provides a range of habitat from old field meadow to 25 (indiscernible) mature trees and it supports a lot - 75 - 1 of bird and animal life and hosts the monarch 2 butterflies on their way south to Florida. The New 3 York/New Jersey Harbor Estuary Program Habitat Work 4 Group named it its priority acquisition list for 5 2006. And when considered with the linkages east to 6 the Hudson River waterfront walkway and west to 7 additional out of use rail beds and utility 8 corridors, the embankment is part of a habitat 9 corridor extending from the Hudson to Hackensack. 10 In this most densely populated of counties, you must 11 not let this rare habitat area be destroyed. Please 12 do not approve this subdivision. Thank you. 13 (Applause) 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 15 Sam Pessin? 16 MR. PESSIN: Sam Pessin, 75 17 Liberty Avenue. I urge you to stand up with courage 18 and with wisdom and not allow a selfish anti- 19 history, anti-open space, anti-greenway developer to 20 destroy the embankment park plan. New York City has 21 the High Line Park and Paris has made an elevated 22 park on former railroad tracks. And Hudson County 23 and Jersey City officials can and should make this 24 vision of an elevated park a reality. I urge the 25 county and Jersey City officials to make the - 76 - 1 embankment a great legacy to future generations like 2 Liberty Park and like the reservoir. And Jersey 3 City should take the embankment by eminent domain if 4 necessary. The Friends of Liberty State Park, which 5 I'm the president of, is an open space advocacy 6 organization with over 900 members, most of them in 7 Hudson County. And we strongly support a Liberty 8 State Park sister urban park on the embankment. The 9 people of Jersey City and Hudson County are hungry 10 for parks. The embankment park will be an exciting, 11 historical, cultural, natural treasure that will 12 lift our spirits and our pride. It will be a place 13 to -- a place of enjoyment for people of all ages. 14 We urge you all and County Executive Tom Verghese 15 and Jersey City Mayor, John -- Mayor Healy, to use 16 your powers and take a strong, principled stand and 17 take action and show visionary leadership to create 18 the embankment park. So please don't approve these 19 subdivisions. Please take a stand for the future. 20 Thank you. 21 (Applause) 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Willow Lethem. 23 MS. LETHEM: Hello, my name is 24 Willow Lethem and I'm a founding member of SAVE. 25 There are brochures being passed around right now. - 77 - 1 That stands for Sustaining Architectural Vitality in 2 the Environment. We're a youth advocacy 3 organization and we are working for a historical and 4 environmental preservation in Jersey City and Hudson 5 County and hopefully some day New Jersey. And the 6 embankment is a really unique resource that many 7 cities would be envious, cities and counties would 8 be envious of and we have it right here free. And 9 it's not only just historic but it's environmental 10 too. And it's something that everyone of all ages 11 can enjoy. And rather than dividing it -- dividing 12 the people who could use it, we should keep it 13 complete and all together as our county is. And 14 it's really a step in the right direction to 15 preserve it. And Hudson County has been taking many 16 steps in the right direction towards environmental 17 and historic preservation, such as preserving the 18 reservoir. And it would be great to continue this 19 march towards really having more open space and 20 historic areas in our county. So it would be 21 excellent if you guys would -- commissioners, if you 22 would help us and help Hudson County by voting 23 against this subdivision. Thank you. 24 (Applause) 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. - 78 - 1 MS. HANKEY: Hi. My name is 2 Ruby Hankey, H-A-N-K-E-Y. I am also a founding 3 member of SAVE. And we represent the future here 4 for Jersey City or we try to as much as we can. 5 There's only so many things that we can say thank 6 you to every day and to have the embankment stay 7 would be so great because it's unique, its 8 beautiful, it has so much potential and we just want 9 for it to stay. It's great. 10 (Applause) 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 12 MS. MOLUPCHA: Hello. My name 13 is Violet Molupcha. I am also a founder of SAVE and 14 I want you all to know that we do represent a much 15 larger group of students all of them want the 16 embankment to be saved. It is an area that we're 17 all very fond of that we hope to see go in the right 18 direction. And I urge you all to disapprove of this 19 subdivision because it would rob us of something 20 very valuable in our city. Thank you. 21 (Applause) 22 SECRETARY MARKS: John Gomez. 23 MR. GOMEZ: John Gomez, 387 24 First Street, Downtown Jersey City. I'd like to 25 list my credentials as our opponents listed their - 79 - 1 credentials. I'm not an engineer. I'm not an 2 architect, I'm not a lawyer. I was born and raised 3 in Jersey City, those are my credentials. I teach 4 here. I'm an educator. All right, I'll open up and 5 tell you my real credentials. I'm the founder of 6 the Jersey City Landmarks Conservancy. I write an 7 architecture column for the Jersey Journal and I am 8 a graduate student at Columbia University. So 9 there. My colleague, Steven Guciardi mentioned that 10 the embankment is on the state register of historic 11 places. It's a municipal landmark. It is the only 12 surviving engineering monument designed by James J. 13 Ferrets. Now you might know that name, James 14 Ferrets, we have a high school named after him. 15 Those land markings -- that land marking and that 16 name, James Ferrets, might not mean anything to the 17 developer and to the fancy lawyers and engineers and 18 architects they hire. But I'm sure it means 19 something to you as residents of Jersey City or 20 Hudson County -- other parts of Hudson County. So 21 please consider that and disapprove of this 22 subdivision. Thank you. 23 (Applause) 24 SECRETARY MARKS: David 25 Greenwood. - 80 - 1 MR. GREENWOOD: My name is David 2 Greenwood. I live at 247 York Street in downtown 3 Jersey City. You commissioners have a tough job and 4 you have to make decisions with a lot of legal and 5 technical matters that you have to take into 6 consideration. But behind all the legal and the 7 technical there has to be, and I believe there is 8 for each and every one of you a question that you 9 really have to ask is, does this decision that I'm 10 about to make, does it help Jersey City? Thank you. 11 (Applause) 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 13 Scott Bekerman? I hope I'm pronouncing it right. 14 Okay. Mr. Chairman, Scott Bekerman had to leave. 15 Mike Kruimer? 16 MR. KRUIMER: Mike Kruimer, 17 KRUIMER, 33 Parkerson Road, Edison, New Jersey. 18 Freeholder Graber would say that's in Middlesex 19 County, the greyest county in the land but since I'm 20 standing here in Hudson County I will not repeat 21 that. I'm the co-chair of New Jersey Community of 22 the East Coast Greenway Alliance along with my wife 23 of thirty-five years, Ann. We were two of the seven 24 riders that rode the first trip from Callous, Maine 25 to Key West Florida in 2004. We were here in Jersey - 81 - 1 City on September 30th of that year. The East Coast 2 Greenway is connecting all the major cities along 3 the east coast with a non-motorized off-road trial. 4 Jersey City in Hudson County is one of those cities. 5 The Hudson River Walkway was a designated part of 6 the East Coast Greenway in 2006. We were looking 7 for an off-road connection between Jersey City and 8 Newark. The Bergen Arches and Harsimus Stem 9 Embankment we hope make that connection. The 10 Harsimus Stem Embankment could become a major non- 11 motorized transportation corridor for both local and 12 long distance travelers. I view it as Jersey City 13 and Hudson County's equivalent of Central Park. You 14 could help make that vision come about. Please 15 don't subdivide the Harsimus Stem Embankment. Make 16 it a local, county, state, east coast and national 17 destination that can be enjoyed by all for centuries 18 to come. Thank you. 19 (Applause) 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. Ann Kruimer? 21 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Ann Kruimer? 22 MS. KRUIMER: Sorry that I'm 23 short. Ann Kruimer K-R-U-I-M-E-R, Edison, New 24 Jersey and a member of the east coast Green Light. 25 Please preserve the indictment and not approve the - 82 - 1 subdivisions. Thank you. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you, 3 Ann. Katherine Grimm? 4 MS. GRIMM: Katherine Grimm, 49 5 Waverly Street, Jersey City. The gentleman that 6 represented the developer and the developer itself 7 do not live in Jersey City. They will not live in 8 Jersey City. They will not live on the embankment 9 area. They are not concerned about the people of 10 Jersey City. Jersey City at this point is number 11 one in pollution in the state. We need all the 12 green we can get to convert that to oxygen that we 13 can breathe and sustain life. The incidence of 14 asthma is on the increase here in Jersey City. The 15 pollution particulates also affect the people's 16 hearts. And the increase in heart disease is also 17 on the increase in Hudson County and Jersey City. 18 Now, I believe we're 600 acres short in green space 19 here in Jersey City itself. The population has 20 increased tremendously in the downtown area. In the 21 next fifteen years there's going to be an increase 22 of another 35,000 people. Which is going to put 23 Jersey City behind in acreage for people again. 24 Now, the method of demolition that is proposed for 25 this site, as was mentioned, it is not a flat lot. - 83 - 1 It is -- has got the embankment on it of stone. 2 If -- I think you people are aware of the 3 architecture of the reservoir. You should be aware 4 it's the same type of architecture on the 5 embankment. In order to demolish the embankment you 6 have to take down these humungous stones that have 7 got to weight, maybe 5,000 pounds. Right. Two 8 thousand five hundred each. Now, Moving those 9 stones over the infrastructure of those streets 10 downtown which have hundred year old water lines and 11 sewer lines, what effort would -- the trucks would 12 have maybe four stones on them per truck load. You 13 know, going over these roads. And the damage that 14 would -- could possibly be done with all this 15 tonnage going over these roads constantly, has to be 16 taken into consideration also. Now, as I said -- 17 now Mayor Bloomberg is proposed to have planted one 18 million trees in the City of New York because of the 19 pollution there. We're going to have less trees 20 here if this -- the project goes through. And also 21 the site for the green belt -- green belt bike 22 trail. That would be bringing a lot of people into 23 Jersey City. Possibly being a benefit because of 24 the tourism. Now, also there's a questions of the 25 ownership. That has not been decided as to whether - 84 - 1 this property was sold in the proper procedural 2 method for selling this property, or whether 3 something was done illegally. That has yet to be 4 decided yet. So how can anything be done pertaining 5 to this property unless you know for sure who owns 6 the property. Thank you. 7 SECRETARY MARKS: Liza Milvano? 8 Okay. Liza has left the room. Christine Bamberger? 9 Mia Scanga? 10 MS. SCANGA: Good evening. Mia 11 Scanga, 89 Bursar Street downtown. A number of 12 years back in 1999 to 2002, I was a member of the 13 Berger Arches Task Force. And this was a study that 14 was -- which was funded by the NJTPA. Was, like, 15 1.2 million dollars. And through our group part we 16 fought vigorously to stop a highway through the 17 Berger Arches because we felt it could be used for 18 better purposes such as light rail. In the end 19 there was no highway and the potential was realized 20 for light rail usage to connect -- eventually to the 21 Meadowlands. And at that time it was mentioned to 22 connect to the 6th Street Embankment and the current 23 HPLRT System. Which was still under construction in 24 2002. So that study saw the merits of connecting to 25 the 6th Street Embankment. Now, recently another - 85 - 1 study founded by the NJTPA, which the public writing 2 portion just ended about a week and a half ago to 3 night. And this was the Jersey City region 4 waterfront access in downtown circulation study. I 5 don't know how many millions that cost. But anyway, 6 the -- what the final results were, were that adding 7 more highways and roads was not going to alleviate 8 the traffic problems downtown. And currently all of 9 the intersections in the downtown area are either at 10 an E or and F level. Which means failure. Okay. 11 And part of their study was to take into 12 consideration all of the growth through 2020. And 13 that was looking at all -- everything that's on the 14 planning board, what's been approved, what have you. 15 And we're looking at gridlock. Okay. And one of 16 the recommendations was intersect parking outside of 17 Jersey City so people would dump their cars and get 18 onto mass transit. Once again, the subject of 19 expanding the HBLRT system came up. And once again, 20 the 6th Street Embankment played a major role in 21 terms of connecting to the Jersey City water front. 22 And on the other end, connecting to the Meadowlands 23 and having some inter -- a lot of intersect parking 24 there, so that they never come into Jersey City via 25 their cars. Now, the embankment, if you were -- if - 86 - 1 you were to approve the subdivision you would take 2 out a major potential mass transit mode for the City 3 of Jersey City. And the future of the city has been 4 a lot of mobility. Whether it's residence or 5 businesses. They're adding thousands of units. All 6 you have to do is take a quick drive down there and 7 then you say to yourself how are these people going 8 to get around. The Grope Street Station path is 9 going to be overrun shortly once the two major 10 projects come on line. So there's going to have to 11 be more people accessing a light rail, accessing 12 fairies, accessing probably the Newport Path 13 Station, what have you. So we're asking you not to 14 hurt the future of Jersey City. We're asking you to 15 maintain this potential mass transit line which 16 would serve thousands of residences and commuters in 17 lieu of having more cookie-cutter housing. Which we 18 have a ton of. And a lot of it is sitting vacant 19 with no buyers. So, let's plan for the future and 20 the future is mass transit. And that's -- mass 21 transit to save our health. And as other speakers 22 have spoken about the air quality in the downtown 23 and Jersey City area is poor currently. For our 24 health, and the prosperity of the region, please 25 vote no for the subdivisions. Thank you. - 87 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Maureen 3 Crowley? 4 MS. CROWLEY: Good morning, 5 coordination of the Preservation Coalition. It just 6 defies common sense for the planning board to 7 approve these changes that provide no community 8 benefit. But only benefit a developer. And that 9 conflict in so many respects with the County's own 10 planning. We ask you to deny these applications. 11 If you are constrained by technicalities of the law 12 to approve these applications, we ask you at the 13 very minimum to provide conditions for your 14 approval. And please report to the governing body 15 the concerns raised at this meeting. It's 16 ultimately up to our elected officials to act, and 17 act quickly to preserve this asset for the people of 18 the County. I hope that you look at your 19 responsibilities in the broad sense, not in the 20 narrow sense. And to do as much as you possibly can 21 to bring this matter to the attention of our elected 22 representatives. Thank you very much. 23 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: Felicia 25 Palmer? - 88 - 1 MS. PALMER: Good evening. 2 Felicia Palmer, 296 6th Street. I was just sitting 3 here listening and I got a chance to listen to all 4 of the objections that were made to the application 5 for the subdivision. And I'm sure some of you were 6 thinking, you know, these objections have nothing to 7 do with the matter at hand. These objections have 8 nothing to do with whether or not we should allow 9 this subdivision to take place. These people are 10 talking about green space, they're talking about 11 parks, they're talking about, you know, air quality. 12 And I think that the real issue is that this 13 subdivision application is only a means towards an 14 end. It's the first step in a process that's going 15 to be taken to essentially make what this developer 16 wants, which is a new property, new development. 17 There is no intention of his to create anything but 18 new development. 19 So that's why these objections 20 do matter in the context of this subdivision 21 application. I really want to just kind of let you 22 guys know that the people here have been working for 23 seven or eight years on this specific project and 24 really fighting for it. And these folks here, 25 they're great, they have great credentials. They - 89 - 1 are here because they have been paid to be here. 2 And I feel sorry for them, because I'm sure they're 3 listening to a lot of these arguments saying, you 4 know, why am I doing this, why am I working on this 5 side when this is a great project. They've been 6 paid to do what they're doing. 7 (Applause) 8 MS. PALMER: We've been paid 9 nothing. We live in Jersey City. We love Jersey 10 City. This is not just a downtown issue. This is 11 people from all over the city who care about Jersey 12 City and who want to do something else besides have 13 more buildings built up. We love the buildings, but 14 we need more than buildings. So I am asking you 15 guys to restore people's belief -- restore our 16 belief in ourselves, restore our belief that people 17 matter. 18 You know, there's been so much 19 development here in Jersey City at the expense of 20 people, without anybody caring about people. And 21 that's just overwhelming this country. So we're 22 asking that you restore our belief that people 23 matter and what we say -- all of the people who came 24 out here tonight who have been working for the last 25 seven years -- that what we say matters. Thank you. - 90 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you, Ms. 2 Palmer. I think your son would like to say 3 something too. 4 (Laughter) 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Mike Selender? 6 MR. SELENDER: Mike Selender, 7 S-E-L-E-N-D-E-R, 159 Jewett Avenue, Jersey City. 8 I'm conservation chair for the Hudson Meadowlands 9 Group called the New Jersey Sierra Club chapter. 10 I'm also on the East Coast Greenway New Jersey State 11 committee and I'm vice president of the Jersey City 12 Landmarks Conservancy. 13 First, I wanted to state that a 14 couple of years ago the New Jersey state chapter of 15 the Sierra Club passed a resolution endorsing 16 preservation of the Harsimus Stem Embankment for 17 both open space and greenway. At that time Mayor 18 Healy's light and rail proposal wasn't on the table, 19 so that wasn't considered at the time. The Harsimus 20 Stem Embankment is a critical link in what we call 21 the historic rail alignment through Hudson County. 22 This is an alignment that would include the Newark 23 industrial line going east from Carney across the 24 Meadowlands, which gives you a spectacular feeling 25 of being in the Meadowlands. The Bergen Arches, - 91 - 1 which gives you a great view of the geology of 2 Bergen Hill, and then the Harsimus Stem Embankment 3 going over the top of it, which would provide a 4 stunning view of downtown Jersey City and the 5 waterfront, and that would get us to the Hudson 6 River waterfront walkway. 7 One of the main reasons for the 8 choice of this alignment is one, we wanted it to be 9 off road, we wanted to avoid having to change street 10 states or alter parking in a city where parking is 11 at a premium. So this gave us an open corridor that 12 was off road that could be used for this purpose 13 without interfering with other modes of 14 transportation and the street grid. 15 Also, we are competing with 16 people on the New York side of the Hudson for the 17 east coast greenway. When it gets to New Jersey, 18 it's actually going to fork. One branch is going to 19 go up from Perth Amboy through Middlesex and Union 20 counties through Newark. And Newark is very far 21 advanced in their greenway plan, comprehensive 22 greenway plan for the whole city, through Carney 23 then east across the rail alignment that I just 24 described. The New York side will have a route that 25 will exit New Jersey on the Goethals Bridge, cross - 92 - 1 Staten Island. And there's a proposed project 2 called the Verrazano Lifeway which will add 3 pedestrian access to the Verrazano Bridge, and then 4 they would follow the Brooklyn Bridge waterfront 5 walkway to get to the Brooklyn Bridge and cross into 6 Manhattan. 7 So we're competing with that. 8 So we need something stunning and spectacular on our 9 side, and we need that historic rail alignment. And 10 the loss of the Harsimus Stem Embankment would cause 11 us to lose a critical part of that alignment and 12 might cause us to have to come up with a totally 13 different alignment, perhaps one that bypasses 14 Jersey City and the Hudson River waterfront walkway 15 altogether, that would go north from Carney along 16 the Hackensack all the way up to the G.W. Bridge. 17 So it would be a great loss for 18 us, and that's why I urge you to not approve 19 this application in order to protect the 20 integrity of this structure, which is historic, 21 as John Gomez has already mentioned, and has a 22 vital dual purpose as both greenway and light 23 rail in the future of Jersey City and Hudson 24 County. Thanks. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. - 93 - 1 (Applause) 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Humphrey Yudo? 3 MR. YUDO: Good evening. My 4 name is Humphrey Yudo. I'm a resident at 282 and a 5 half 6th Street, which is actually right in front of 6 the embankment. I actually am a new resident to 7 Jersey City. I've been living, for the past thirty- 8 six years, in Manhattan, New York. Growing up -- 9 you guys have an incredible amount of construction 10 and gentrification that is currently underway here 11 in Jersey City. I'm not an authority. As I said, 12 I'm a new resident. But I've experienced the same 13 thing being a resident of New York. 14 Growing up I lived on 94th 15 Street and 1st Avenue, which when I was growing up 16 was in no man's land. I went to the United Nations 17 school. My parents were with the U.N., but my 18 friend's parents wouldn't let them come to my 19 neighborhood because at that point it was still kind 20 of shaky. But as you all know, just driving through 21 that same area right now, it's a very busy, 22 happening, you know, hopping area. I see a lot of 23 New Jersey, you know, a lot of New Jersey as it 24 presently is in what was once, at least my area of 25 New York, which was, when I was growing up, peaceful - 94 - 1 and tranquil. It had a certain, you know, non- 2 homogeneity of people. It was mixed. It was great. 3 But that all changed and it changed very quickly. 4 Here in Jersey City, I see a lot 5 of, you know, as I said, gentrification. But that's 6 good. But I think that there's also an important 7 duty on your part to, you know, as somebody said 8 before, to be, you know, have a visionary aspect of 9 what's going on here. I just came here by default. 10 I invest in properties. I have three condos in New 11 York and I just bought a townhouse in Jersey City 12 and I want to keep on buying and doing that on the 13 side. 14 I'm a lawyer, that's what I do. 15 But, you know, as I said I came here by default. 16 But what was very charming to me was discovering the 17 embankments, because first I wondered what they 18 were, but in actuality, I mean, it's an oasis. On 19 the top floor of my house you can see the, you know, 20 the forestry and the wildlife that is up there. 21 And I would be directly impacted 22 if those walls were to come down because, you 23 know, as I said, if you sit in my apartment you 24 can enjoy the sun from, like, three floors in 25 the house. You can see, you know, right into, - 95 - 1 you know, greenery, which is beautiful. And 2 you know, it's nice, once again, to have the 3 peace and tranquility that I once felt in New 4 York which I escape to here. So I urge you to 5 deny fully these applications. Thank you. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 7 (Applause) 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 9 that's it as far as what I have for public speakers 10 who have signed up. May I ask if there's any other 11 speakers? 12 MR. PELLETIER: I haven't 13 written anything. I haven't written -- my name is 14 Chris Pelletier. I live at 477 Monmouth Street with 15 my wife in Jersey City, only for about four years. 16 But the embankment was the first thing I saw when I 17 came here. In fact, the first day I was here I 18 walked the whole length of it. I couldn't believe 19 the stones are so beautiful. I found a -- I found 20 somebody had inscribed on the stones a love note 21 from 1934. And I mean, this is so incredible. And 22 to tear these beautiful stones -- these huge 23 beautiful stones down to put up flimsy structures, 24 it would just be a shame. And that's what I have to 25 say. - 96 - 1 (Applause) 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 3 MS. D'ESPOSITO: I'm Linda 4 D'Esposito. I live at 357 Palisade Avenue. I was 5 involved with Reservoir Three. I'm not up to snuff 6 on all the facts here but I will share conversation 7 I overheard at a fundraiser for a charter school. A 8 woman said, I am leaving Jersey City because 9 Jersey -- I love the people in Jersey City but it 10 has not been good to me. They're bringing in all 11 these condos and there's no place for people to go. 12 She said I can't take it anymore. I'm going. I'm 13 going to Westfield. 14 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 15 (Applause) 16 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: On behalf of 17 the board, we're going to take a five minute recess 18 in caucus to discuss some of this stuff. Because we 19 do vote on many subdivisions but not to this extent. 20 Mr. Alampi would you like to state anything else 21 before we break? 22 MR. ALAMPI: I have to just 23 bring to your attention, maybe your counsel will 24 allow the North Broward Case, you indicated, to take 25 a five minute break but not to discuss this outside - 97 - 1 the public. So I think the assumption -- you mean 2 you're taking a five minute break to absorb this. 3 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: To absorb it, 4 correct. 5 MR. ALAMPI: I'm preserving the 6 record because we have such a large crowd of 7 residents from Jersey City and they're very 8 impassioned. Many very articulate, knowledgeable, 9 more knowledgeable then I am with regard to the 10 issues that pertain to their life with regard to the 11 ecology and the environment. They've spent many 12 years working in these organizations and I respect 13 that. But as impassioned as their words were, it 14 went far astray from what the proceedings are and 15 the law. And I understand people (indiscernible) 16 because we use and employ the law to enforce the law 17 and some people feel there's an injustice in that 18 because maybe there should be more to it than the 19 law. But if you break down the rule of law, then 20 you have chaos. The proceedings are quite simple. 21 This is a subdivision application for a fully 22 conforming application in every aspect. And you 23 have a very limited review, a review that is 24 provided to you by the County Enabling Act and by 25 the various resolutions of your board of Freeholders - 98 - 1 to review the subdivision. 2 So you have a difficult situation 3 here. You have a large crowd, you respect them. 4 You're representing the interest of the public and 5 the property owners, my clients as well, and you 6 want to be sensitive to it. But please don't 7 abandon your role and your duty under the law to 8 process this. 9 Having said that, I guess it's 10 best to take a few minutes break, re-gather your 11 thoughts and we'll continue. Thank you. 12 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 13 (Recess from 8:43 till 8:52 p.m.) 14 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: We're going to 15 resume the meeting. Mr. Marks, we'll proceed. 16 We're waiting for Commissioner Bettinger. 17 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: I'd make 18 a motion to go into closed session. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: I have a 20 motion from Commissioner Holloway to go into closed 21 session. Do I have a second? 22 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Second. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 24 there's a motion on the floor by Commissioner 25 Holloway to go into closed session, seconded by - 99 - 1 Commissioner Mehta. Commissioner Arencibia? 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 3 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 4 Bettinger? 5 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 7 Fitzgibbons? 8 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 9 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 10 Holloway? 11 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 13 Mehta? 14 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Aye. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 16 Ng? 17 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 19 Choffo? 20 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 21 MR. ALAMPI: Mr. Chairman the 22 motion to go into closed session; do you have state 23 a purpose and the duration of that? 24 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: It will be 25 five to ten minutes and the reason is the - 100 - 1 outstanding legal issues involved in this. 2 MR. ALAMPI: This application? 3 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: In this 4 application. 5 MR. ALAMPI: I'll just note my 6 objection. 7 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 8 Thank you, Mr. Alampi. 9 (Closed session from 8:54 till 9:13 p.m.) 10 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 11 And we continue, Mr. Marks, with the meeting. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 13 I think you have to have a motion to go back on the 14 record out of closed session. Is that correct? 15 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do I have a 16 motion to go back on the record? 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Motion. 18 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Second. 19 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do I have a 20 motion to move on this application? 21 MR. SPEAKER: Motion. 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do I have a 23 second? We need a second to vote on this 24 application. We need a second. 25 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Second. - 101 - 1 MR. CALVANICO: Just so that 2 we're clear, I believe that the motion made by 3 Commissioner Bettinger was to open the matter up for 4 vote. 5 MS. SPEAKER: Right, exactly. 6 MR. SPEAKER: Exactly. 7 MR. CALVANICO: It wasn't to 8 approve the application. 9 MR. SPEAKER: To approve -- 10 right, exactly. 11 MS. SPEAKER: It's a vote to 12 approve, okay. Take a vote. 13 MS. SPEAKER: I'll move on the 14 application. 15 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Second. 16 MR. SPEAKER: All those in 17 favor? 18 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: We had a 19 motion to move on Commissioner Bettinger's -- and 20 seconded by Commissioner Holloway. We'll take a 21 vote now. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. A 23 motion made by Commissioner Bettinger seconded by 24 Commissioner Holloway. Commissioner Arencibia? 25 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: - 102 - 1 Abstain. 2 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Okay. 3 Abstain. Go ahead. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. 5 Commissioner Avagliano abstains. Commissioner 6 Bettinger? 7 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I feel 8 that I was appointed to this commission to represent 9 the community and I feel the community has spoken, 10 and I vote no. 11 (Applause) 12 MR. SPEAKER: I'm a little 13 confused. I thought the motion was -- and I didn't 14 hear the roll call or anything -- to open the 15 proceeding to vote. 16 MR. SPEAKER: You're correct. 17 The motion was to open the voting. 18 MR. SPEAKER: To resume the 19 meeting, though. 20 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: To vote 21 on the project. 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: We did that 23 first, to resume the meeting. I'm sorry. He didn't 24 hear a roll call for that, Steve. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chair, I - 103 - 1 have to go through the roll call to open the meeting 2 back up, correct? 3 MR. SPEAKER: Okay. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. 5 MR. CALVANICO: Again, so that 6 the record is clear, the vote now being proposed 7 before the commissioners is to reopen the meeting, 8 to end the executive session and to reconvene the 9 meeting. 10 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Go ahead, 11 proceed with the roll call. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Oh, the roll 13 call, okay. 14 MR. CALVANICO: This is to open 15 the motion back up, Steve. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. 17 Commissioner Arencibia? 18 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Here. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 20 Avagliano? 21 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 23 Bettinger? 24 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Here. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner - 104 - 1 DeDomenico is not present. Commissioner Dublin is 2 not present. Commissioner Fitzgibbons? 3 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Here. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 5 Holloway? 6 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Here. 7 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 8 Mehta? 9 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Yes. 10 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 11 Ng? 12 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 14 Choffo? 15 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Here. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 17 we have a quorum once again. 18 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Now, do I have 19 a motion to move on this application? 20 MR. SPEAKER: Motion. 21 MR. ALAMPI: Mr. Chairman, I 22 didn't conclude the full presentation. I didn't 23 give a summation. I know at the end, when you were 24 breaking, I started to speak. But I do have a few 25 comments. - 105 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Oh, my 2 apologies. 3 MR. ALAMPI: Thank you. 4 Chairman, members of the board, the witness that we 5 produced this evening from Shore Dipamost swore 6 under oath to tell the truth and did, of course, 7 certify and prepare the set of plans before you, 8 which is a depiction or illustration of the subject 9 property showing a fully conforming parcel of land 10 in the R1 residential zone, and indicated that it 11 had complied in all ways with the municipal code of 12 ordinances of the city of Jersey City which provide 13 for lot sizes of 25 by 100, as a matter of right, 14 and indicates that the site plan, which is part of 15 the public record, was for development of attached 16 two-family homes. They achieved all the setbacks, 17 the heights and such requirements. Although you're 18 not passing on the site plan this evening, only on 19 the subdivision, there is no variance, no deviation, 20 and no failure to proceed. 21 I bring to your attention that a 22 court order is in place from Judge Gallipoli, which 23 rebuked the board and planning board of Jersey City 24 and installed an approval for the major subdivision 25 and for the preliminary major site plan. The court - 106 - 1 dealt with the issues of the sale of the property, 2 the quality of title, the surface transportation, 3 bill of proceedings, dealt with these issues and 4 determined the scope of review of the board as it 5 would determine the scope of review by this board. 6 Although it may be interesting 7 to find out how certain legal matters will play out, 8 it is not something that should be considered at 9 this level. It's not something that should cause 10 you to hesitate on whether to approve or disapprove 11 this application. This application should be 12 approved based on the merits of the application and 13 the proofs that it's fully conforming. If there is 14 a basis for denial, it cannot be concerns in general 15 of a better use of the property or the possibility 16 that there could be transit or whatever. 17 If this property is to be 18 acquired through the process of negotiation or 19 eminent domain, so be it. But none of those 20 procedures have been properly followed and brought 21 to a final point. So this board has to review what 22 are the rights of this private property owner to 23 develop his own land in a way that is conforming to 24 the zone, not in a way that is repugnant to the zone 25 but conforming to the zone. - 107 - 1 This board has to look at the 2 development of this property. And if it's concerned 3 about open space preservation on this particular 4 parcel of privately owned land, then let the 5 appropriate agencies take legal action and let the 6 proper process unfold. But it is improper to use or 7 to deny the planning process in order to hold the 8 property out for that purpose. 9 So I bring to your attention 10 that you may have some concerns. I agree with the 11 Commissioner that she took an oath and she's here to 12 serve all the public, not just my client. I agree 13 with you -- and serve the interests of the public. 14 But the public's interest may not be served at the 15 point of which my client's basic due process and 16 constitutional rights are abridged. There are 17 procedures. It is not an appropriate procedure to 18 withhold approval on a fully conforming application. 19 Now, if the board takes its vote 20 and articulates our failure, perhaps I could respond 21 to it. If it doesn't indicate the points of failure 22 in failing to comply with the subdivision act, with 23 the county planning enabling act, and with those 24 parameters, then I'm at a loss to understand the 25 rationale of the board's decision. Thank you. - 108 - 1 Thank you, Mr. Alampi. Go ahead, Mr. Marks. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 3 I prepared a memorandum for the board's edification, 4 if I could just briefly go through the points on 5 this. With regard to -- and this applies to both 6 this application as well as all four applications, 7 all four subdivision applications, 1907, 2007, 2107, 8 2207, with regard to the County Planning Board 9 authority and jurisdiction. This 6th Street 10 embankment is located on a local street in Jersey 11 City and does not appear to impact county roads or 12 drainage facilities. Therefore, the site plans are 13 exempt from County Planning Board jurisdiction. The 14 owner/developer has submitted four separate 15 subdivision applications to divide each block into 16 sixteen parcels with each new lot accommodating a 17 two-family home. The County Planning Board has 18 right to review each application pursuant to New 19 Jersey statues 4027-6.2 and other provisions. While 20 the County Planning Board has the right to review 21 each subdivision, it is evident that the newly or 22 proposed subdivided lots do not impact county roads 23 or drainage facilities. In addition, the proposed 24 subdivided lots appear to be consistent with the 25 design standards of the Hudson County subdivision - 109 - 1 and site plan resolution. 2 Number two, the Hudson County 3 open space and recreation plan. The Harsimus Stem 4 Embankment, which is also known as ID number 131 by 5 the state historic preservation office, was entered 6 onto the state register of historic places on 7 December 29, 1999. The site was also determined to 8 be eligible for the national register of historic 9 places on March 16, 2000. However, due to 10 objections, this site never achieved national 11 register status. 12 The next point is on March 24, 13 2005, the board of chose freeholders accepted the 14 recommendations of this board, the Hudson County 15 planning board and approved and adopted the Hudson 16 County open space and recreation plan. The Harsimus 17 Stem Embankment is listed at least three times. 18 That's a typo, it says twice. It's at least time in 19 the Hudson County open space and recreation plan. 20 The first reference lists the 21 site as a historic and cultural resource worthy of 22 preservation, which is found on page 123 of the 23 plan. The second reference lists the site on the 24 county's priority acquisition list, which is on page 25 170 of the plan. And the third reference is - 110 - 1 contained in the comments at the end of the plan on 2 pages 196 and 201. Under miscellaneous, in January 3 2006, as was stated earlier, the city of Jersey 4 City, the Rails to Trails Conservancy, the 5 Pennsylvania Railroad Harsimus Stem Embankment 6 coalition, and assemblyman Lou Manzo, filed a 7 petition with the Federal Surface Transportation 8 Board to determine if the consolidated rail 9 corporation or Conrail, needed prior agency 10 authorization to abandon the embankment. To date, 11 the Surface Transportation Board has not issued a 12 ruling. 13 On August 7, 2006, state 14 superior court Judge Maurice Gallipoli, under docket 15 number HUD-L-000804-06 entered a judgment granting 16 preliminary subdivision and site plan approvals for 17 development of the embankment. The Jersey City 18 planning board had previously denied the subdivision 19 and site plan application by the developer and 20 owner. 21 And, finally, under 22 recommendations, the County Planning Act is quite 23 vague when addressing situations applications such 24 as this. Under New Jersey statutes 40, title 40, 25 chapter 27-6.2, paragraph B, the County Planning - 111 - 1 Board is authorized to require the dedication of 2 rights of way for any roads or drainage ways shown 3 on a duly adopted county master plan or official 4 county map. While the embankment is not a roadway 5 per se, the embankment is listed in Hudson County's 6 open space and recreation plan and delineated on 7 Hudson County's green map as part of the east coast 8 greenway, as a linear park and trail system, which 9 is also located on page 151 of the county's open 10 space plan. 11 I also brought a copy of the 12 county's open space plan if anybody -- if any of the 13 commissioners would like to take a look. While the 14 County Planning Act is vague on the subject, the 15 provisions from the municipal land use law often 16 give direction to professional planners. In the 17 municipal land use law, it addresses situations like 18 this more clearly under title 40, chapter 55d, 19 section 44, which provides for the reservation of 20 public areas. It says "If the master plan or 21 official map provides for the reservation of 22 designated streets, public drainage ways, flood 23 control basins or public areas within the proposed 24 development, before approving a subdivision or site 25 plan, the planning board may further require that - 112 - 1 such streets, ways, basins or other areas be shown 2 on the plot and locations and sizes and suitable to 3 their intended purposes." 4 It goes on to state that the 5 municipality has one year to duly compensate the 6 property owner for essentially the taking which is 7 taking place. A recent New Jersey State Supreme 8 Court case upheld the municipality's statutory 9 authority to condemn property for open space even if 10 the town exercises the power on properties where 11 residential development is planned. 12 In Mount Laurel Township v. 13 Mipro Homes, LLC, which is New Jersey's Supreme 14 Court, A85/86, decided on December 7, 2006, the 15 local planning board had given final subdivision 16 approval. However, when the township failed to 17 acquire the Mipro site voluntarily, the township 18 mayor and council, the governing body brought a 19 condemnation action and filed a declaration of 20 taking a week later. The court also ruled that the 21 value of the planning board's approval had to be 22 taken into consideration when calculating the 23 condemnation price. 24 In conclusion, while the County 25 Planning Act clearly gives the right to review and - 113 - 1 comment on the subdivision of the 6th Street 2 embankment, this site has no apparent impact on 3 county roads or drainage facilities. Therefore, the 4 County Planning Board has little recourse but to 5 approve the application. However, it is incumbent 6 upon the County Planning Board to advise the 7 applicant developer that the site has been 8 designated for acquisition in the county open space 9 and recreation plan. If applicable, the applicants 10 should be give notice pursuant to municipal land use 11 law, section 44, that the property is targeted for 12 reservation as a public area. 13 Several of the speakers tonight 14 had alluded to the plans by the city of running a 15 light rail, which may sound contrary to open space 16 purposes, but it's a public utility nonetheless. 17 However, if that provision is not applicable, the 18 reservation as a public area, the applicant 19 developer should be given notice that the county 20 executive and freeholder board may exercise the 21 county's right to condemn the site for a public 22 purpose, i.e. a park open space or historic 23 preservation. 24 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you, 25 Stephen. - 114 - 1 MR. ALAMPI: Mr. Chairman, Mr. 2 Mark's very, very articulate explanation of the law 3 is substantially consistent with my understanding of 4 the law. There's no question that a government has 5 the authority and power in their own domain to 6 employ eminent domain for the purposes of building a 7 bridge or a hospital with the open space 8 preservation. So we don't disagree with each other 9 as to the government's ability if it so chooses. 10 But it hasn't so chosen to do that yet. It's just 11 identified the property and has maybe targeted the 12 property. I would agree with Mr. Marks that any 13 action that you take, if you take an affirmative 14 action, that you would probably make reference to 15 the issue that the property has been listed in 16 acquisition, just to keep the record straight. We 17 know this. We own the property. I want to bring to 18 your attention the case of Builders Association of 19 New Jersey v. the Township of Burlington which is a 20 case cited by the appellate division 353 New Jersey 21 supra 4, cited in 2002. And this case severely 22 limited the scope of jurisdiction and review by a 23 County Planning Board under the county planning 24 enabling act and the appropriate resolutions passed 25 by its board of freeholders in Burlington County. - 115 - 1 So when Mr. Marks made the 2 reference to the Supreme Court case regarding the 3 authority to condemn, that is the law. You might 4 recall last week that our courts took a step back 5 from the Kilon decision in Connecticut where the 6 United States Supreme Court said that you can 7 condemn property because you believe, you or the 8 government believes it could be put to a higher or 9 different use and you have the ability to condemn 10 that property. 11 Our New Jersey Supreme Court 12 rejected that notion and took one step back and said 13 there is an abuse of using the eminent domain laws 14 in the area of redevelopment properties and you 15 better well get your studies together when you 16 designated might and use that power. So there was 17 the New Jersey courts saying no to the Kilon 18 concept, which I think most people feel it's an 19 abuse of the government to take people's property 20 because some developer could make money on it and do 21 better than what they want to do and they live on 22 it. That's not this case. No one's living on the 23 embankment. We are providing and plan to provide 24 housing consistent with the development pattern of 25 the community and in compliance with the zoning - 116 - 1 that's in place. And so I command to your 2 attention, I'm sure that Tom has some knowledge of 3 this. I've only become aware of this in preparation 4 of this for tonight. I don't know all the law. 5 Anybody who professes to know all the cases is a 6 fool. 7 But in preparation for tonight I 8 researched and studied the builders of New Jersey 9 case v. Burlington. It's a very important case to 10 analyze, and it's come to a head tonight. It 11 defines the limit of your jurisdiction and your 12 authority and when you have property that does not 13 impact and abut a county road or a county drainage 14 facility, you have very limited jurisdiction, not 15 only in site plan but even in subdivision. 16 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: If we had no 17 jurisdiction, you wouldn't be here. I mean, it's 18 something that we'd have to vote on. 19 MR. ALAMPI: That's not how the 20 law works. The law works that I must exhaust all my 21 administrative remedies. I can't just defy you -- 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: But do it in 23 front of court. 24 MR. ALAMPI: -- and repudiate 25 you and then run to court. I've got to subject - 117 - 1 myself to the process. I have to accept the 2 fairness of the proceedings, which they've been very 3 fair, eminently fair. I have no issues with that 4 regard. But you can't say that by filing it I 5 subjected and acquiesced and have accepted what 6 authority you have. What it is, is that I'm 7 exhausting my administrative remedies. This is a 8 requirement if we're to seek any judicial relief. 9 Now, I commend the Burlington 10 case to your attention and indicate to you that as a 11 matter of law, as a matter of case law and of the 12 statutes that were referred to, even your own 13 planner says well, our law is not specifically on 14 this point, it's somewhat vague, but we have the 15 parallel law under the municipal land use statute 16 which regulates municipalities, not the county 17 planning board. It's an intelligent approach, don't 18 get me wrong. But I don't think that his analysis 19 took into consideration this Burlington case. 20 With that said, I urge you to 21 follow the lead of law and to grant this 22 subdivision. Although you may feel that there is 23 public resistance, there are other forms. For 24 example, touching any of the walls on this property 25 requires us to go through another process through - 118 - 1 the city of Jersey City, through the historic 2 preservation commission and through the demolition 3 permit process and the certificate of 4 appropriateness. And if there's an appeal, back to 5 the board of adjustment and further appeal by 6 prerogative to the court. 7 So perhaps you feel that you 8 might be letting down the public because you're 9 taking action in an affirmative sense and I urge you 10 to take the necessary step to grant the subdivision 11 because there are other procedures that we yet have 12 to deal with that address the issue of the reports. 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 14 MR. ALAMPI: Thank you. And if 15 I can, Mr. Chairman, if you vote on this matter, 16 however it is, would we have to go through the full 17 hearing presentation on each of the three remaining 18 applications? 19 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I believe not 20 at this point. Right, Steve -- I mean -- I'm sorry, 21 Mr. Calvanico. 22 MR. CALVANICO: I'm sorry. I 23 didn't hear the question. 24 MR. ALAMPI: The question was 25 depending of course upon the disposition of the vote - 119 - 1 on this matter, do we have to go through the 2 presentation of each of the other three applications 3 or -- 4 MR. CALVANICO: No, absolutely 5 not. 6 MR. ALAMPI: Can we accept for 7 the record without prejudice -- 8 MR. CALVANICO: No, no. 9 MR. ALAMPI: -- to your party 10 that we represent the same -- 11 MR. CALVANICO: No. 12 MR. ALAMPI: -- exact testimony. 13 We have provided the plans. We have filed the 14 application. I could rest on the plans. 15 Technically, I don't have to produce a witness if 16 I've produced the plans that are conforming such as 17 this and I could rely on it. So I'm suggesting that 18 we could proceed with a full hearing on each of the 19 other three or we could dispense with it. I will 20 not say to you, and I say this now in the 21 presentation, that this is a trick and I have taken 22 advantage of it because you didn't allow me to 23 present it. Nor will you say to me oh, Mr. Alampi, 24 you should have presented each of those cases in 25 full, otherwise we would have -- you know what, - 120 - 1 we're denying this but we would have granted the 2 other -- 3 MR. SPEAKER: This guy's a wise 4 guy. 5 MR. ALAMPI: So I think what 6 will happen is whatever is disposed of here will 7 carry through the agenda. I know you have a busy 8 agenda. 9 MR. CALVANICO: That's a 10 reasonable approach. I don't have a problem with 11 that. 12 MR. SPEAKER: I think the 13 commissioners would agree also. 14 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Any questions 15 from any commissioners? Do I have a motion to move 16 to vote on this application? 17 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Motion. 18 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Second 19 it. 20 MR. SPEAKER: To move on it? 21 Okay. 22 MR. SPEAKER: Let's make the 23 record clear. What are we going to vote -- are we 24 voting whether to approve or disapprove of this 25 application at this point? - 121 - 1 MR. SPEAKER: Yes. 2 MS. SPEAKER: This application. 3 MR. SPEAKER: Yes. We're voting 4 to approve or disapprove. 5 MR. SPEAKER: Is the motion to 6 approve the application? 7 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: We're 8 voting on this application. 9 MR. SPEAKER: We don't need a -- 10 MR. SPEAKER: We don't need -- 11 okay. 12 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: We're 13 going to vote on this application. 14 MR. ALAMPI: If I might segue 15 way in, it's either a motion to approve with certain 16 conditions or it's a motion to deny. Obviously, 17 you're going to take some action. So for the record 18 it has to be clear what you're voting, if you're 19 voting to approve it or deny it. Somebody has to 20 articulate that. 21 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I'll make a 22 motion to disapprove this application. 23 MR. ALAMPI: And as I 24 requested, I need to request articulated reasons 25 behind the motion. That's required under the law. - 122 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Because of the 2 fact that we voted previously on the open space act. 3 This board has and we feel that it's -- I feel that 4 it's in conflict with what I voted on in the past. 5 (Applause) 6 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: It's nothing 7 against your clients, Mr. Alampi. It's something 8 that our board voted on in the past about an open 9 space act. And that's why I vote to disapprove this 10 site Plan -- subdivision, I'm sorry. 11 MR. ALAMPI: You voted on the -- 12 well, there's three things on it. There's the 13 county master plan. Then there's a county wide 14 parks and recreation plan -- 15 MS. SPEAKER: No, open space. 16 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Excuse 17 me. Excuse me. I think we're voting. You know, 18 this back and forth -- we're here to vote. 19 MS. SPEAKER: Let's stop it. 20 Let's get it over with. Let's vote on this plan. 21 MR. CALVANICO: Before we go 22 ahead, there's a motion on the table by the 23 Commissioner. Before we get into the give and take, 24 the Commissioner will provide his answers when it 25 comes the time to vote on that. - 123 - 1 MS. SPEAKER: Yes, sir. 2 MR. CALVANICO: But I think we 3 need to determine at this point whether there's a 4 second to the motion, and if so, then we can proceed 5 with the roll call. And at the time of the roll 6 call the commissioners can place their reasons for 7 voting one way or the other on the record. 8 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: This is 9 a different way of voting. I just want to make sure 10 that I vote correctly. So your motion that was made 11 was not to approve this application? 12 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Right. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner, 14 there's a motion on the floor by chairman Choffo to 15 disapprove or deny the application. 16 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'll 17 second that motion. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 19 there's a motion to disapprove or deny the 20 application of SD-19-07 made by Chairman Choffo, 21 seconded by Commissioner Bettinger. Commissioner 22 Arencibia? 23 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: I 24 abstain. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner - 124 - 1 Avagliano? 2 COMMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: I vote 3 no because I voted on the Hudson -- 4 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Just 5 say deny. 6 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: All 7 right. I vote no to deny. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Let's be 9 clear, you're voting to deny the application? 10 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: I'm 11 going to deny. I'm denying, yes. 12 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Yes. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: So that's an 14 aye, that would be a yes vote on the motion to deny? 15 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Yes, 16 right. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 18 (Applause) 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 20 Bettinger? 21 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I have 22 to give a reason, though. I want to give my reason. 23 I'm voting aye to deny the vote. 24 (Applause) 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner - 125 - 1 Fitzgibbons? 2 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: I 3 voted for the master plan for that and worked on the 4 master plan for the county. I also voted for the 5 county open park plan which all this was in. And I 6 would be a hypocrite if I did not deny this plan. 7 So I deny it. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: You're denying 9 this one, okay. So, Commissioner, you're voting aye 10 to deny? 11 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Yes. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 13 Holloway? 14 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: I vote 15 yes to not approve this. This board approved a 16 Hudson County open space recreation plan. And it 17 would be against this board prove this and improve 18 that one. So I vote no. 19 (Applause) 20 SECRETARY MARKS: You're voting 21 yes to deny? 22 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Yes. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. 24 Commissioner Mehta? 25 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Contrary to - 126 - 1 even the laws, like attorneys said yesterday, as 2 well as the county had their very limited 3 jurisdiction on the site plan approval. But at the 4 same time, as the county planning board, we approved 5 this open space act as well as this embankment and 6 when any application comes in front of us we always 7 look for the first thing whether the local approval 8 is done or not. And in this case, Justice Gallipoli 9 basically denied the applicant, you can say, 10 permission and that they went to the usual process. 11 And there's a couple of other laws which are going 12 on, so there's not enough information for me to act 13 right now. And if the motion is there to, you can 14 say, deny the application, I will say yes to deny 15 the application, because like other Commissioners 16 suggested and we voted for the open space act and 17 this is according to that plan. Then definitely I 18 don't want to contradict myself in saying that I am 19 for the development. So I am voting yes to deny 20 this application. 21 (Applause) 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 23 Ng? 24 COMMISSIONER NG: I vote yes to 25 deny this application. - 127 - 1 (Applause) 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 3 the application is denied. 4 (Applause) 5 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I didn't vote, 6 Steve. 7 SECRETARY MARKS: He didn't 8 vote. I'm sorry. 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: That's okay. 10 SECRETARY MARKS: I'm sorry. 11 Since you made the motion, I made -- 12 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: That's okay. 13 I vote aye because it conflicts with my previous 14 votes on the open space act. 15 (Applause) 16 MR. ALAMPI: Mr. Chairman, for 17 the record, it would be a similar vote on all of the 18 remaining three, correct? 19 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Correct. I 20 think Mr. Marks will read them out and we will vote 21 on them individually, just for the record. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman, the 23 next application is SD-20-07 280 Erie Street, LLC -- 24 MR. SPEAKER: Not again. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: -- which is - 128 - 1 located at 6th Street, block 280, lot 50A in Jersey 2 City. 3 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'd 4 like to make a motion to deny this application. 5 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: I will 6 second it. 7 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 8 on a motion to deny the application made by 9 Commissioner Bettinger, seconded by Commissioner 10 Mehta. Commissioner Arencibia? 11 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: 12 Abstain. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 14 Avagliano? 15 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: 16 Abstain. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 18 Bettinger? 19 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 21 Fitzgibbons? 22 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 24 Holloway? 25 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. - 129 - 1 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 2 Mehta? 3 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Aye to deny 4 the application. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 6 Ng? 7 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 9 Choffo? 10 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 12 the motion -- the application is denied. Mr. 13 Chairman, the next application scheduled for public 14 hearing is SD-21-07 389 Monmouth Street, LLC located 15 at 6th Street, block 398.1, lot 50 in Jersey City. 16 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Motion 17 to deny. 18 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Second. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: And, Mr. 20 Chairman, there is a motion to deny the application 21 SD-21-07 made by Commissioner Bettinger and seconded 22 by Commissioner Holloway. Commissioner Arencibia? 23 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: 24 Abstain. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner Avagliano? - 130 - 1 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: 2 Abstain. 3 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 4 Bettinger? 5 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I vote 6 aye to deny this application. 7 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 8 Fitzgibbons? 9 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 10 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 11 Holloway? 12 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 14 Mehta? 15 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Aye. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 17 Ng? 18 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 20 Choffo? 21 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 23 the motion passed to deny the application of SD-21- 24 07. Mr. Chairman, the next application scheduled 25 for public hearing is SD-22-07 354 Coles Street, - 131 - 1 LLC. Located at 6th Street, which is block 354.1, 2 lot 50a in Jersey City. 3 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'll 4 make motion to deny the application. 5 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Second. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 7 on a motion made by Commissioner Bettinger seconded 8 by Commissioner Holloway to deny the application SD- 9 22-07. Commissioner, Arencibia? 10 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: 11 Abstain. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 13 Avagliano? 14 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: 15 Abstain. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 17 Bettinger? 18 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I vote 19 aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 21 Fitzgibbons? 22 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 24 Holloway? 25 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. - 132 - 1 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 2 Mehta? 3 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Aye. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 5 Ng? 6 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 7 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 8 Choffo? 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 10 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 11 the motion passed to deny the application SD-22-07. 12 Mr. Chairman, the next application scheduled for 13 public hearing -- thank you, Mr. Alampi. 14 MR. ALAMPI: Hold on just one 15 second. A resolution will be prepared at the next 16 meeting? 17 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: A 18 memorialization at the next meeting. 19 MR. ALAMPI: In July? A 20 memorialization? 21 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: Yes. 22 MR. ALAMPI: In July? 23 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: Yes. 24 MR. ALAMPI: Thank you. 25 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you, Mr. - 133 - 1 Alampi. You may be seated, thank you. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: For the 3 record, Mr. Chairman, I think the County Planning 4 Act, any denial we have to send notice to the 5 municipality within ten days. So I don't -- unlike 6 an approval which gets memorialized thirty days 7 hence, I believe we have to send notice out within 8 ten days. 9 MR. ALAMPI: And publication as 10 well? 11 SECRETARY MARKS: I'll check. 12 It's in the county legislation. 13 MR. ALAMPI: You still have to 14 do a memorialization. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 16 MR. ALAMPI: Thank you. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Alampi, 18 just your attention for one second, please? 19 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: Just so 20 that the record is clear since we went into 21 executive session before, I just wanted the record 22 to reflect that notes were taken by myself at the 23 executive session since they concerned legal matters 24 and potential litigation. Those notes will be 25 sealed at this point until any litigation or - 134 - 1 potential litigation is resolved. And they will be 2 maintained as official records of the planning 3 board. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you, Mr. 5 Calvanico. 6 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I was going to 7 ask you whether or not the tape recording is kept. 8 But in lieu of that, we just use your personal 9 notes? 10 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: Yes. 11 MR. ALAMPI: Okay. I'll 12 probably request them in due course. 13 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: Okay. 14 All right. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 16 (Applause) 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 18 the next application scheduled for public hearing is 19 SD-29-07, Jersey City Housing Authority located at 20 320-340 Duncan Avenue which is block 1651, lots 1, 2 21 and 3 in Jersey City. 22 MR. SHALJIAN: Good evening. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Good evening, 24 sir. 25 MR. SHALJIAN: My name is Ronald - 135 - 1 Shaljian. I'm with the firm of Shuman Hanels. 2 MR. SPEAKER: Soften him up for 3 us. 4 (Laughter) 5 MS. SPEAKER: What did he say? 6 MS. SPEAKER: Soften him up for 7 us. 8 MR. SHALJIAN: It's Ronald 9 Shaljian, S-H-A-L-J-I-A-N, of the firm of Shuman 10 Hanels and I'm here on behalf of the Jersey housing 11 authority, the applicant in this matter. Good 12 evening, Mr. Chairman. 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Good evening. 14 MR. SHALJIAN: Members of the 15 board, as mentioned, the Jersey City Housing 16 Authority is in the process of redeveloping the A. 17 Harry Moore project on Duncan Avenue. And during 18 the course of the development of that project into 19 to phases, it was necessary to subdivide the 20 property and resubdivide the property to get 21 specific lot lines in order for the development to 22 proceed. I have with us this evening the surveyor 23 of record from Langan Engineering who is prepared to 24 testify. Mr. Romano? 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Good evening. - 136 - 1 Could you state your name for the record? 2 MR. ROMANO: Joseph Romano. I'm 3 the senior vice president in charge of surveying for 4 Langan Engineering. 5 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do you mind 6 swearing him in? 7 (Witness is duly sworn) 8 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: You may 9 proceed. 10 MR. SHALJIAN: Mr. Romano, would 11 you tell the members of the board the purpose of 12 this application and why we're here this evening? 13 MR. ROMANO: Sure. The 14 application centers around a subdivision which is a 15 six block subdivision, originally there was a minor 16 subdivision created which created the mother parcel 17 of one lot into three. That was a minor 18 subdivision. It was perfected by deed. We have a 19 major subdivision this evening which will create 20 three additional lots and that subdivision will be 21 perfected and filed by map. We're creating -- this 22 is the existing -- 23 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do you mind 24 moving that up a little bit? And can we mark that? 25 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: Just - 137 - 1 identify the document. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: You can just 3 identify it. 4 MR. SHALJIAN: Sure. It's the 5 subdivision plan, sheet 0501 prepared by me and 6 signed 6/19/07. 7 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Okay. 8 MR. ROMANO: This subdivision 9 plan takes the three lots that we've created by the 10 minor and we'll create three additional lots which 11 just are there as a function of the development. 12 This site plan was approved by the city and the 13 subdivision was approved by the city. In the 14 application that was submitted the lot line has been 15 adjusted four feet between lots four and five and 16 that was in order to cancel out a requirement for a 17 density variance. So on the original plan this line 18 was straight. We've revised the plan to adjust that 19 line four feet. 20 MR. SHALJIAN: And is that line 21 adjustment necessary for the project to proceed and 22 for construction to continue on the project? 23 MR. ROMANO: Yes, it is. 24 MR. SHALJIAN: And is it 25 necessary for the financing of the project of the - 138 - 1 developer which is overdue at the present time? 2 MR. ROMANO: Yes. 3 MR. SHALJIAN: I don't have any 4 further questions for this witness. 5 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Did Jersey 6 City approve this? 7 MR. ROMANO: Yes, they did. 8 MR. SHALJIAN: And we had 9 intended to come before the board last month because 10 it was an emergent situation because our closing was 11 about to take place on a daily basis. And then 12 there wasn't a meeting last month. And now we're 13 advanced the thirty days and the closing is waiting 14 until the board views this application tonight. 15 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Go ahead, 16 Steve. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: I'm sorry. 18 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: Can you 19 explain why the lots are this odd shape 20 configuration? 21 MR. ROMANO: The lot lines are 22 driven by the development and for that I would have 23 to get the site plans. A lot of times surveyors 24 make the subdivision map and they are contingent 25 upon where the architect and the rest of - 139 - 1 development, they really drive where the lines go. 2 MR. SHALJIAN: Mr. Calvanico, I 3 think the intent of the housing authority is to 4 ground lease a portion of the site to a private 5 developer who is going to develop certain buildings. 6 And this was the only way to do it to get the 7 financing that he needed. One of the lots, the 8 larger lots, is going to continue as a public 9 housing site. But the whole site will be continued 10 to be owned by the Housing Authority. It will not 11 be sold in any way, shape, or form. But it's 12 necessary for the ground lease. Mr. Cevino, I don't 13 know if you have anything else to say. I mean, he 14 can answer whatever questions -- 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Just identify 16 the document for the record. 17 MR. SHALJIAN: Certainly. It's 18 site plan sheet 20-01. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Your name for 20 the record? 21 MR. CEVINO: Sure, Leonard 22 Cevino, senior associated at Langan Engineering and 23 Environmental Services. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: Did you get 25 the site plan, 21? Okay. - 140 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Go ahead, you 2 can proceed. Does the board have any other 3 questions of the professionals? 4 MR. ARENCIBIA: Yeah, Mr. 5 Chairman, the location of this Duncan Avenue is at 6 the corner of truck route 1 & 9? 7 MR. CEVINO: It is not actually 8 on the corner. There's a small lot between 440's 9 right of way and -- 10 MR. ARENCIBIA: Oh, okay. It 11 looks like a parking lot, right? 12 MR. CEVINO: No, I think it's -- 13 MR. SPEAKER: It's a strip mall 14 of some sort. 15 MR. CEVINO: Yeah, there's a 16 small store there. 17 MR. ARENCIBIA: Oh, right. 18 Across the street from Duncan Avenue is Lincoln 19 Park? 20 MR. CEVINO: That's right. 21 MR. ARENCIBIA: I think that's a 22 county park. And where is the relation of the 23 park's entrance to the new driveway? 24 MR. CEVINO: You can see a 25 circular entrance just across the street. - 141 - 1 MR. ARENCIBIA: Oh, okay. And 2 was this application or another part of it at one 3 time in front of the planning board? 4 MR. SHALJIAN: This board? 5 MR. ARENCIBIA: Yes. 6 MR. SHALJIAN: I believe we were 7 about a year -- Phase one I think we were here a 8 year, fourteen months ago, if I remember correctly. 9 MR. ARENCIBIA: Right. 10 MR. SHALJIAN: That's a good 11 question. 12 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Okay. Steve, 13 did you have a question? 14 SECRETARY MARKS: No, I didn't, 15 Mr. Chairman. 16 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Oh, I thought 17 you did. Any questions from any of the 18 commissioners? Do I have a motion? 19 MR. FITZGIBBONS: I'll make a 20 motion to approve. 21 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: I second 22 it. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 24 on a motion to approve application SD-29-97 made by 25 Commissioner Fitzgibbons seconded by Commissioner - 142 - 1 Mehta. Commissioner Arencibia? 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 3 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 4 Avagliano? Commissioner Avagliano's not present. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 6 Bettinger? 7 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 9 Fitzgibbons? 10 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 12 Holloway? 13 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 15 Mehta? 16 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Aye. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 18 Ng? 19 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 21 Choffo? 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 24 the motion passed. 25 MR. SHALJIAN: Mr. Chairman, I - 143 - 1 would just ask the indulgence of the board, I 2 brought the drawings with me tonight, the 3 subdivision drawings. I'd like to leave them with 4 the county engineer because we really need to get 5 these signed and reported for the closing which is 6 going to be any day now. 7 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 8 MR. SHALJIAN: If I can impose 9 on the county engineer and Mr. Marks to sign off on 10 it, I'd appreciate it. 11 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: You want it 12 signed tonight, is that it? 13 MR. SHALJIAN: I'd like to -- 14 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 15 MR. SHALJIAN: Good, that would 16 be great. I'll wait as long as I have to wait. 17 Thank you. 18 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 20 it is 10 o'clock this evening. According to our 21 bylaws we needed two-thirds affirmative vote of the 22 board to continue the public hearing. 23 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: I'm sorry to 25 bring this to your attention. - 144 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: No. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: But it's -- we 3 need a vote of two thirds to continue. 4 MR. FITZGIBBONS: I'll make a 5 motion to continue. 6 MR. SPEAKER: What was that? 7 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: To continue. 8 MR. SPEAKER: Continue? 9 SECRETARY MARKS: Is there a 10 second? 11 MR. MEHTA: How many applicants 12 are there? 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 14 there are approximately one, two, three, four, five, 15 six, seven, eight applications. Of the eight 16 applications, it's really six because there's for 17 administrative purposes the applications for 18 subdivision and site plans were submitted at 19 separate times. So it's actually six applications. 20 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: You 21 know, the problem is that we cancelled the last 22 meeting and that's how come everything's backed up. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: That's 24 correct. 25 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: It's - 145 - 1 not fair that the other applicant -- 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Yeah, exactly. 3 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: -- 4 they're here. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: I need a 6 second to continue. 7 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'll 8 make a motion to continue. 9 SECRETARY MARKS: Well, there's, 10 Mr. Chairman, there is a motion made by Commissioner 11 Fitzgibbons to continue the meeting. 12 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Second 13 it. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 15 Bettinger to second. Okay, Mr. Chairman, on a 16 motion made by Mr. Fitzgibbons to continue the 17 meeting, seconded by Commissioner Bettinger. 18 Commissioner Arencibia? 19 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 21 Avagliano? Commissioner Bettinger? 22 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 24 Fitzgibbons? 25 MR. FITZGIBBONS: Aye. - 146 - 1 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 2 Holloway? 3 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 5 Mehta? 6 COMMISSIONER MEHTA: Well, I -- 7 SECRETARY MARKS: We'll 8 understand if you have to go. 9 MS. SPEAKER: He's going to get 10 Duncan Doughnuts. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 12 Ng? 13 COMMISSIONER NG: I'll be 14 leaving too. I have a business meeting, another 15 business meeting to go to. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. 17 SECREARY MARKS: Commissioner 18 Ng? 19 COMISSIONER NG: Aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 21 Choffo? 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 24 the motion passed. 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Okay. - 147 - 1 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 2 the next application scheduled for public hearing is 3 SD-39-06, Harrison Commons, LLC located at Frankie 4 Rogers Boulevard, blocks 114A, 115, 116 and 117 in 5 Harrison, New Jersey. 6 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Mr. Marks, for 7 the record, I would like to record -- the record's 8 going to reflect that I have a business affiliation 9 with Harrison Commons, therefore I'm going to recuse 10 myself from this application and turn the meeting 11 over to Vice Chairman Fitzgibbons. 12 MR. FITZGIBBONS: Which one is 13 this, Steve? 14 SECRETARY MARKS: This is 15 application SD-39-06. Mr. Chairman, for the record, 16 the subdivision application was submitted by 17 Harrison Commons well over a year ago; it was May 18 2006. It was missing or incomplete in sections of 19 it. And earlier this year the applicant submitted 20 the site plans which are also on the agenda under 21 SP-09-07. The part and parcel of the same 22 application but for administrative purposes because 23 the applications were submitted at different times, 24 they were assigned different application numbers. 25 It's up to you to treat both applications at the - 148 - 1 same time or separately. 2 MR. FITZGIBBONS: At the same 3 time. Let's accept them as one, right? 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. We can 5 discuss them, Mr. Chairman, as one, but when I take 6 the roll call -- 7 MR. FITZGIBBONS: As two. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: -- it will 9 just reflect two applications? 10 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Yes. 11 MR. ROBINSON: Matthew Robinson 12 from LGA Engineering and I am the applicant's 13 engineer. I'm representing him tonight. I'd like 14 to be sworn in. 15 (Witness is duly sworn) 16 MR. ROBINSON: My experience, 17 I'm a professional licensed engineer in the state of 18 New Jersey. I have a Bachelor of Science degree in 19 engineering science from the college of New Jersey 20 and a master degree from New Jersey Institute of 21 Technology. I'm employed by LGA Engineering where I 22 am a project manager and I have been working now for 23 five years. The application tonight, and I don't 24 have a map to render, includes a combination of 25 buildings. We have residential buildings that are - 149 - 1 mixed use. They have -- where it front ends along 2 Frankie Rogers Boulevard, on the first floor of the 3 buildings along Frankie Rogers Boulevard we have 4 commercial space, about thirty thousand square feet 5 of commercial space. Then above those buildings we 6 have residential space. We have 412 residential 7 units. We also have, down in this portion of the 8 space, parking grounds that will ultimately part of 9 the county authority's domain. The application is 10 along Frankie Rogers Road and it is a county road. 11 That is why we're here before you. We have gone 12 through all the technical issues with the 13 professional staff. We have -- we're not increasing 14 any county drainage. We are adding some inlets to 15 improve the collection of water within Frankie 16 Rogers Boulevard, but we're not adding any water to 17 the road. 18 We have gone through all the 19 technical issues and resolved them with your staff. 20 We're going to be doing some widening of Frankie 21 Rogers Road, about four foot widening. And 22 improving the sidewalks and lighting. I'll try and 23 keep it brief. I don't want to go into too much 24 detail because I think we've gone through everything 25 with your staff. The staff did issue two letters - 150 - 1 and I believe we'll be willing to comply with the 2 comments in both those letters, one from Mr. Marks 3 and Mr. Reimon. If the board has any further 4 questions I'd be delighted to go into greater 5 detail. But I know that it's getting late, so I'll 6 try and keep it brief. 7 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Do we 8 have anything that the county wants to say? 9 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Well, 10 if you want me to -- Mr. Vice-chairman, we met with 11 Medina Consultants as well as with the applicant a 12 number of times to resolve some of the issues 13 including the widening of the road which will be 14 done in, I guess, a two-step phase because they're 15 going to be doing their widening along their front 16 edge of the property and then across the street on 17 the other side of the street, that will be done by 18 that owner whenever they come in to develop their 19 site. 20 And all of the drainages is 21 really taken care of and the decorative lighting, 22 there was a letter, I guess, a few days ago or last 23 week that it came out. The decorative lighting is 24 something I guess the county would be paying, the 25 electrical billing on. - 151 - 1 MR. ROBINSON: Okay. The 2 township planning board secretary had indicated to 3 us that the town actually right now -- I guess 4 there's some confusion. 5 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 6 MR. ROBINSON: Right now the 7 town is paying for the lighting within Frankie 8 Rogers as well as the other municipal streets that 9 we're on. 10 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Okay. 11 MR. ROBINSON: And they're going 12 to continue that arrangement. 13 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: All 14 right. 15 MR. ROBINSON: So the lighting 16 will be -- 17 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: So 18 really you're dealing between -- with the town. 19 MR. ROBINSON: Correct. 20 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: -- of 21 Harrison. 22 MR. ROBINSON: Between the 23 applicant and the town. 24 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: So then 25 we're out of the lighting then. - 152 - 1 MR. ROBINSON: Right. 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: And 3 there's also a traffic signal that the applicant 4 will be installing that will come through my office 5 to get that approved through DOT. 6 MR. ROBINSON: Correct. There's 7 a relocating to the streets around Middlesex -- the 8 intersection of Middlesex and Frankie Rogers. We're 9 going to present a lighting plan, an exact detailed 10 plan for approval by the DOT to Demetrio, whose 11 approval is a condition. 12 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Was 13 this approved by the Harrison Planning Board? 14 MR. ROBINSON: The site plan has 15 been approved by the Town of Harrison; the 16 subdivision is currently being reviewed pending an 17 upcoming meeting. So the subdivision has not been 18 approved but the site plan has. 19 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Mr. 20 Chairman? 21 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Yes. 22 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: There 23 seems to be some concern on behalf of public service 24 about the relocating of the traffic signal to the 25 entrance of the facilities? - 153 - 1 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Well, I 2 think that's not in the project area. The PCG 3 property is on the other side, right? 4 MR. ROBINSON: Yeah. 5 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yeah. 6 MR. ROBINSON: That's not in 7 front of our frontage. That's another developer. 8 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: These 9 are comments that were made by our zoning officer so 10 I just wanted to address them. 11 MR. ROBINSON: Right. I think 12 they were reflecting a plant that showed the 13 improvements along Frankie Rogers Boulevard for the 14 full length in front of our project and the other 15 developer's project. It was submitted as one and 16 there was a letter generated that referred to both 17 areas. There was one comment about the exit from 18 Somerset Street which is in the middle of our 19 development to Right Turn Only which we're going to 20 do. I think that was the only one that really 21 affected our development and we're going to comply 22 with the other plan. 23 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Okay. 24 Thank you. 25 MR. ARENCIBIA: There's also a - 154 - 1 dedication of property to the county for the 2 widening, is that correct? 3 MR. ROBINSON: The roadway's 4 being widened by four feet. I believe it stays 5 within the current right of way, the right of way 6 dedication to the local municipality on the local 7 municipal plans. 8 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Do you 9 know about that? 10 MR. REIMON: I don't think -- 11 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Do you 12 know where the right of way line is in relation to 13 the new road? 14 MR. REIMON: There is no change 15 in right of way. 16 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Well, 17 there's a change in the current road set back. 18 MR. REIMON: It's four feet, 19 actually, wider on the east side where there is no 20 opposition involved over there. 21 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Well, 22 I'm just wondering -- 23 MR. REIMON: Because you're not 24 planning sidewalk over here. 25 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: I just - 155 - 1 don't know what the, you know, distance is. 2 MR. REIMON: Oh, it would be in 3 the site plan. 4 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yeah. 5 MR. REIMON: It's shown on the 6 site plan, the existing sidewalk is approximately 7 fifteen feet in width. It goes down to the eleven, 8 twelve -- 9 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Oh, 10 okay. 11 MR. REIMON: The way the 12 buildings jog back, there's some additional space 13 created. 14 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: We 15 already had a pretty wide right of way. 16 MR. REIMON: Correct. You have 17 eighty feet of right of way here. 18 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: 19 Existing. 20 MR. REIMON: So the existing is 21 eighty and you're going to have for the lanes 22 eleven, eleven for the lanes and then you're going 23 to have eight for the median. So you still have 24 plenty of sidewalk. 25 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Do we - 156 - 1 have any other Commissioners with questions? Do we 2 have a motion? 3 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 4 this is on the first application, the SD-31-06 and 5 then I'll do a roll call on the following 6 applications. 7 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Yes. 8 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'll 9 make a motion to approve. 10 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Second. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 12 there's a motion on the floor to approve 13 application, the subdivision application SD-39-06 14 made by Commissioner Bettinger, seconded by 15 Commissioner Avagliano. Commissioner Arencibia? 16 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 18 Avagliano? 19 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 21 Bettinger? 22 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 24 Fitzgibbons? 25 MR. FITZGIBBONS: Aye. - 157 - 1 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 2 Holloway? 3 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: I 4 abstain. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 6 Ng? 7 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 9 the motion passed. 10 MS. SPEAKER: It's your 11 application, you've got to stay. 12 MR. SPEAKER: Oh, all right. 13 MR. SPEAKER: I just want to get 14 out of this seat. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 16 the next application is SP-09-07, Harrison Commons 17 LLC. These are the site plans for Frankie Rogers 18 Boulevard, blocks 114A, 115, 116 and 117, in 19 Harrison, New Jersey. 20 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'll 21 make a motion to approve. 22 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Second. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 24 on a motion to approve application SP-09-07, made by 25 Commission Bettinger, seconded by Commissioner - 158 - 1 Avagliano. Commissioner Arencibia? 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 3 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 4 Avagliano? 5 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 7 Bettinger? 8 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 9 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 10 Holloway? 11 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Abstain. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 13 Ng? 14 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 16 Fitzgibbons? 17 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 19 the motion passed. 20 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Thank 21 you. I -- I'm going to give my seat up to --to the 22 Chairman. 23 MR. ROBINSON: Thank you. It's 24 the hot seat tonight 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: MR. CHOFFO: Thank you, - 159 - 1 Vice Chair. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. -- Mr. Chairman, the 3 next application scheduled for public hearing is SD- 4 61-06, Fraternity Meadows, LLC, located at New 5 County Road, block 5, lots 3 and 5, in Secaucus, New 6 Jersey. Mr. Chairman, similar to the last 7 application, Harrison Commons, the subdivision 8 application for this site was submitted just about - 9 - yeah, almost in parallel with the last 10 application. Although I don't think they had 11 anything to do with each other. The subdivision 12 application was submitted just -- just over a year 13 ago and the site plan application was submitted 14 either later in 2006, early 2007. So 15 administratively they were assigned different 16 numbers because they came in at different times. 17 But we could discuss both at the same time. 18 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 19 Save us some time. 20 MR. O'CONNOR: Good evening, my 21 name is Tom O'Connor. I'm an attorney with the law 22 firm Waters, McPherson, McNeill, representing 23 Fraternity Meadows, LLC. As Mr. Marks indicated 24 this is a major subdivision application. The 25 purpose of the subdivision is to create six - 160 - 1 development lots and two lots, which are actually 2 public parks. The subdivision will also create 3 several public streets which would be owned by 4 the -- the Town of Secaucus. There's a main 5 boulevard and two intersecting streets. The -- the 6 plans that were submitted consisted of some ninety- 7 three sheets. We wouldn't go through all of them 8 tonight. We'll just go through a few of them. And 9 we'll have Mr. Cascino, the engineer briefly 10 describe the subdivision and the site plan. But 11 this, perhaps the telescope, that I can give you a 12 little bit more of the background. The -- the site 13 plan application is for one residential building, 14 which is a 304 unit building. That building is the 15 first phase, first of the six development lots. The 16 building includes, as I said, 304 residential units, 17 sixty-four of those units are affordable units, 18 which qualify as --as co-units. And they'll be 19 administered through the Town of Secaucus, 20 affordable housing board. The project also includes 21 the installation of the public streets, the public 22 sewage system, and a sanitary sewer system, which is 23 being constructed and has been viewed and approved 24 by the Secaucus Municipality Utilities Authority. 25 The -- the site plan was -- all of this property is - 161 - 1 within the jurisdiction of the New Jersey 2 Meadowlands Commission. The site plan was approved 3 by the New Jersey Meadowlands Commission in July of 4 last year and then amended in February of this year. 5 So the site plan is fully approved and fully 6 conforming. The subdivision, likewise, the -- the 7 plot and all of the improvement plans, the details, 8 have been reviewed and recommended for approval by 9 the Meadowlands staff. We had a public hearing last 10 month on it. There is -- there is one technical 11 requirement for a variance, or as they refer to it, 12 a deviation on the redevelopment plan. The park 13 lots are actually -- because they're not development 14 lots are less than three acres in size. So there's 15 a variance that's pending for those. But other than 16 that, the plan is fully conforming as far as the 17 subdivision and the site plan. The property, just 18 to orient you, is located adjacent to the -- the 19 Loral Hill County Park. It's between the county 20 park. It's bounded by the Hackensack River on the 21 other side. Essentially the New Jersey Turnpike on 22 the eastern side of the site where the old temporary 23 jail was, and a warehouse building on the -- on the 24 north side. It's an approximate -- it's a large 25 site. It's approximately sixty-eight acres. It's - 162 - 1 the old former Gala landfill, which accepted the 2 Ash -- Ash landfill from the old Jersey City 3 incinerator. It had -- it's approximate to the 4 transfer station, the Secaucus Rail Transfer Station 5 and thus is -- been designated as a part of a 6 transit village. The Meadowlands adopted in 2004 7 the Secaucus transit village redevelopment plan of 8 which this is a part. The redevelopment plan 9 actually covers about 230 acres. This site is sixty 10 acres of that. But -- within this site, because 11 it's so close to the train station, about ninety 12 percent of the residential development is slated on 13 this property. The redevelopment plan provides for 14 a maximum retain 1805 units of market rate housing, 15 plus approximately 230 units of affordable housing. 16 So we're looking at a project which is a little over 17 2,000 units. The project is to be developed in 18 phases. That's why the major subdivision is 19 submitted with the six different development 20 parcels. What we're asking you to approve tonight 21 is the subdivision to create the lots in the 22 streets, as well as the site plan for the first 23 phase of that development. The first 300 units. 24 And we would anticipate as the development proceeds, 25 over the next several years, we'll be coming back to - 163 - 1 the board with each phase of the site plan. With 2 that, I would call George Cascino, who is the 3 project engineer. 4 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: George, could 5 you just state your name for the record? 6 MR. CASCINO: George Cascino 7 C-A-S-C-I-N-O. 8 G E O R G E C A S C I N O, having been first duly 9 sworn according to law, testified as follows: 10 MR. O'CONNOR: Mr. Cascino, 11 you're a professional engineer and planning in the 12 state of New Jersey? 13 MR. CASCINO: Yes. I'm a 14 licensed professional engineer in the states of New 15 Jersey and Pennsylvania. And I'm a licensed planner 16 in the State of New Jersey. And I held both of 17 those licenses for -- I hate to say it, about 18 thirty-five years. 19 MR. O'CONNOR: And you've -- 20 okay. I was going to say, you've been doing it for 21 a long time. And you've -- you've prepared or 22 supervised the preparation of all of these plans? 23 MR. CASCINO: Yes, I did. 24 MR. O'CONNOR: We'll be offering 25 Mr. Cascino's testimony as a professional planner - 164 - 1 and engineer. 2 MR. O'CONNOR: Mr. Cascino, 3 perhaps just referring to the -- and I should point 4 out for the record, there are -- there are five 5 plans mounted here. Mr. Cascino identified each. 6 But they're all just copies of the plans that were 7 submitted in part of the packet. There's no 8 difference between these plans and the plans that 9 were submitted. So, George, could you just describe 10 for us the subdivision and the six lots -- eight 11 lots, I guess, to be created? 12 MR. CASCINO: Yes. As Mr. 13 O'Connor mentioned, the site is sixty acres in size. 14 Bounded on the southwest by the Hackensack River on 15 the east by the Loral Hills County Park, on the 16 north by County Road Extension and a little bit on 17 the east by the county road. Of the sixty acres, of 18 the site, the proposal has been worked out over the 19 last several years with Secaucus and the Meadowlands 20 Commission, was to provide for six developable lots 21 separated by certain roads. Very shortly is a cul- 22 de-sac road that goes from the north-south direction 23 into the project with a circle, a traffic circle 24 half way through, which we call Road A. The other 25 side of the site, with a road we call Road D, runs - 165 - 1 from County Road Extension down to a main boulevard 2 through the site. Which runs in a east-west 3 direction. Also terminating at a circle. The main 4 thorough fare in the subdivision, what gives it the 5 whole transit village its romance, is an east-west 6 road. Which is a one-way going west and one-way 7 going east. We call it Road B and C. They're forty 8 foot wide, right-of-ways that provide access for not 9 only cars but for pedestrians on the side, parking, 10 bike ways. The whole idea of the Secaucus Transit 11 Village was not to have your typical ticky-tacky 12 cookie cutter subdivision. What the Meadowlands 13 wanted to see and what we've designed is a transit 14 village. Meaning that the buildings are closer to 15 the road. There's limited amount of parking except 16 in parking gara -- 17 (Break in audio) 18 SECRETARY MARKS: So if you just 19 show us -- you have an exhibit that shows the site 20 with the building -- 21 (Break in audio) 22 MR. CASCINO: We'll do that. I 23 have a plan called, pedestrian bicycle circulation 24 plan. There's a plan and basically what it shows 25 in -- we used a color coded here. In red, it shows - 166 - 1 the bike paths as they go through the entire 2 property. The Meadowlands Commission was very 3 insistent that this be a user friendlier residential 4 pedestrian bicycle path friendly neighborhood. Even 5 though there's a lot of units, was to tie them all 6 together. By the way, the Secaucus Transfer Station 7 is physically is located about here in scale. So 8 you can see the housing development is within 9 walking distance of Allie Junction Secaucus Transfer 10 Station. The area in green showing on this plan are 11 all the pedestrian walks which go through the site. 12 I mentioned earlier six developable lots. One, two, 13 three, four, five, six, and two neighborhood parks, 14 on two separate lots in the center of the 15 development are neighborhood parks. As well as a 16 riverfront park, which is off on the Hackensack 17 River. The areas in blue are combination pedestrian 18 paths and bike paths throughout the projects. So 19 the whole idea here was to get bicycles transports, 20 pedestrian transportation, walking along the river 21 and throughout the entire development. That was the 22 philosophy of it. 23 MR. O'CONNOR: Could you point 24 out along the riverfront the walkway, the Secaucus 25 Greenway? - 167 - 1 MR. CASCINO: Secaucus has a 2 plan called the Secaucus Greenway Plan. And it 3 connects a walking path and the bicycle path all the 4 way the Hackensack River in Secaucus on the eastern 5 banks. We proposed to put that portion of the 6 Greenway thorough our development, couple thousand 7 feet. It runs from County Road Extension on the 8 north down south and it ties right into where your 9 facilities are at the Loral Hills County Park. We'd 10 be tying in right just north of your -- your little 11 marina and your boat launch. And that's a walkway 12 that has -- is wide enough to walk, to bicycle and 13 has landscaping between our development and the 14 walkway. And then it looks out onto the river. 15 MR. O'CONNOR: Now the bulk of 16 those ninety-three sheets you've prepared show 17 details as to storm sewers, sanitary sewers. And 18 just very briefly describe to us what it explains. 19 MR. CASCINO: Yes. In 20 accordance, there are two main infrastructure 21 improvements that are going here besides the 22 streets. The first one has to do with storm water. 23 In accordance with the strictest standards of the 24 Department of Environmental Protection, all water 25 that falls out of the sky and falls onto parking - 168 - 1 lots nowadays has to be treated before it can be 2 discharged into the river. Eighty percent of the 3 total suspended solids have to be taken out of that 4 before it's allowed to be discharged. So it meets 5 the DEP regulation. In fact, our initial premise 6 has already been received by the DEP. The second 7 major infrastructure improvements are sewers. It 8 was necessary to design a sanitary sewer system on 9 site that flowed by gravity from the extremity of 10 the site to the center. In the center of the site 11 we are building a pump station. That pump station 12 will then take all the sewerage from the unit and 13 pump it towards the north and tie into existing 14 facilities of the Secaucus Municipal Utilities 15 Authority. Which we are upgrading so that they're 16 able to take our additional flows. And eventually, 17 they will connect to an interceptor of Secaucus at 18 the intersection of County Avenue, County Road and 19 New County Road. So, we're collecting it by gravity 20 and then we're pumping it to get into the Secaucus 21 interceptor away from us. And they've already given 22 us their approval to do that. And now it's pending 23 state approval. 24 MR. O'CONNOR: And just for the 25 record, there is an agreement between the developer - 169 - 1 and the Secaucus Municipal Utilities Authority for 2 the Utilities Authority to take ownership of that 3 pump station. And they'll own it and maintain it. 4 One last feature. Could you show us on this plan 5 where the first building phase is and then perhaps 6 show us the detail of that one. 7 MR. CASCINO: Yes. The first 8 phase called, phase one. Affectionately called 9 Building C, is located in the north -- one of the 10 north-east quadrants of the site. And I'll flop 11 over real quick. And this is the blow up. It's a 12 plan entitled, site plan zoning certificate building 13 C. And it's a blow up of the four story building. 14 And in the center of the four story building is a 15 parking deck. So as you're driving on the streets, 16 whether it's on Avenue B or on New County Road, 17 you'll see the front facade of the building, but you 18 will not see what's interior, inside the building, 19 which is the parking deck. That's one of the 20 features that the architects came up with. But 21 basically it's got the various architectural 22 features, it's not -- it's not a square, it's not a 23 rectangle. It's got feet. And it's got 24 architecture design and romance to it. So not only 25 will it look good from the outside architecturally, - 170 - 1 but you won't even see the parking that's associated 2 with it. Which was what the spirit of the transit 3 buildings were supposed to accomplish. And across 4 the street from the building is what we call the New 5 Neighborhood Parks. Now all the buildings are 6 designed so that they look interior towards the 7 neighborhood parks. 8 MR. O'CONNOR: Right. And over 9 the course of the last several months, we've had 10 several meetings in coordination with the staff and 11 the consultants. We've attended two of the 12 subcommittee meetings and gone through these in 13 detail. So, with that -- that's all the questions I 14 have. And if you want to ask -- ask any questions 15 or have any comments. 16 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: If I 17 may, Mr. Chairman. You're -- phase one is -- can 18 you just go over the time schedule in the phasing 19 for the whole project? 20 MR. O'CONNOR: The -- the 21 project is obviously large. It will probably be 22 developed over a ten, twelve, maybe fifteen years of 23 the full build out of the -- of the six development 24 areas. The first phase is -- actually, the -- is 25 under construction. What's the -- so we're looking - 171 - 1 at completion date of March '08 for the first 304 2 unit building. The second phase is likely to be -- 3 the corner lot which includes -- I should have 4 mentioned in addition to the residential -- the 5 zoning permits up to 150,000 square feet of retail. 6 But what the developer is proposing is 30,000 square 7 feet. Which is intended to basically serve that 8 community. In all likelihood, that development lot 9 which includes the 30,000 square feet of retail and 10 residential boat, would be the second phase in order 11 to get some retail and some services into the 12 community. And then it will just proceed in 13 whatever order that makes sense to develop. I will 14 tell you that -- a large percentage of the -- of the 15 units to be constructed are active adult units. 16 Based on agreement with the Town of Secaucus about a 17 third of the units will be active adult. And 18 they'll probably be build inter -- interspersed in 19 the phasing project. 20 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: If I 21 may again, one of the things that are very critical 22 that we're kind of unsure about, is the Meadowlands 23 Commission, their share, plan with what the costs 24 are going to be that you're going -- 25 MR. O'CONNOR: I apologize. I - 172 - 1 should -- yeah, I should explain -- one of the 2 things that we've been working on also through the 3 past year with the Meadowlands, is they have -- we 4 have our traffic consultant. They prepared their 5 comprehension traffic impact studies. And they've 6 been coordinating that with the Meadowlands who have 7 been developing a Meadowlands transportation 8 district plan. And essentially what that plan has 9 done is taken information from this project and 10 other proposed projects in the -- in the region and 11 determined -- made recommendations as to long range 12 all of the major intersection improvements that are 13 going to need to be made in the area. And what that 14 study also did is they -- they developed a formula 15 based on your traffic generation as to a fair share 16 of contribution towards those traffic improvements. 17 This project is participating in that. It's a 18 condition of the zoning certificate of approval for 19 the first building that that building is going to 20 pay its fair share. What we envision happening with 21 the project and the way the -- the program is set up 22 is that there's a fair share of what your impact is 23 going to be determined. And then there's analysis 24 of what -- what are the most immediate traffic 25 improvements that need to be done. And essentially - 173 - 1 a project like this would likely to be putting in a 2 traffic signal, let's say, Castle Road and New 3 County Road. And then we'd get credit against a 4 fair share for actually doing that. So that the -- 5 the most needed improvements will be put in first as 6 part of that program. Now, the -- they've issued a 7 draft report on -- on what all of those improvements 8 are going to be and what the courses are going to 9 be. And that will be developed, I think, relatively 10 quickly over the course of this year. And certainly 11 as we talked about at the committee meeting, that as 12 this project comes in for the next five subsequent 13 phases, there can be a relook at those traffic 14 issues and those improvements and see how the 15 project is doing. 16 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 17 Well, we're -- we're very depending on the 18 Meadowlands Commission for doing that. And I just 19 want to make sure that -- that if we do enter an 20 issue that needs to be addressed immediately by -- 21 because of the development it should be addressed by 22 the owner. If it needs to be a traffic improvement 23 of some kind in the immediate area of the site. 24 MR. O'CONNOR: I think from the -- I 25 know that the Meadowlands appeared at one of the - 174 - 1 Committee meets. 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 3 MR. O'CONNOR: And I think 4 there's been a -- kind of, a communication 5 established there that -- to make sure that doesn't 6 get lost. 7 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yeah. 8 I mean, it's a work in progress from what it sounds 9 like from them. So that's something, I'd say, that 10 we want to make sure that the applicant will agree 11 to that. You know, should it be an issue that comes 12 up that needs to be addressed before the Meadowlands 13 Commission can come up with their plan. Because it 14 is a plan in progress. 15 MR. O'CONNOR: I -- I think that 16 this -- one of the reasons I mentioned it's a 17 multiphased development. All we're asking you to 18 approve today is basically the subdivision which 19 lays out the lot lines -- 20 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 21 MR. O'CONNOR: -- and the 22 streets. And the first phase -- 23 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: First 24 phase. 25 MR. O'CONNOR: -- which is part - 175 - 1 phase -- 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: And 3 you'll be coming back? 4 MR. O'CONNOR: -- which each of 5 you can focus in. 6 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: And 7 you'll be coming back for each subsequent phasing, 8 right? 9 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Mr. O'Connor, 10 are you going to be coming back for each phase, all 11 six phases? 12 MR. O'CONNOR: Looks like it. 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 14 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: It 15 don't like it. It looks like it going to be -- 16 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: A few 17 other things too is the -- they should meet at the 18 site distance for the driveway on the New County 19 Road is adequate, since we got a bend on that Lower 20 Hill Road that comes into New County Road. Now the 21 driveway further down there. So the shipping is 22 fine. I hope its okay. But if it becomes a problem 23 in the future with accidents of some kind and we 24 have to prohibit left turns or something of that 25 kind at that driveway if that becomes a problem. - 176 - 1 But -- my concern happens to be because of the curve 2 and the buildings if they're too close and you can't 3 see coming out of the driveway. 4 MR. CASCINO: Just so you know, 5 this building is only shown graphically. It hasn't 6 even been finally designed yet. 7 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 8 MR. CASCINO: There's a good 9 chance that that site distance, what you're seeing 10 as a problem, may not even be on the table. 11 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 12 That's all I'm saying. It could be a problem and it 13 may not be a problem. But if becomes a problem 14 then, we may have to prohibit a tur -- a left turn 15 or whatever needs to get done to take care of that 16 problem. So, hopefully gets addressed when you do 17 your final plans and submit them. So actually so we 18 can take a look at, during that final design. 19 MR. O'CONNOR: Certainly, as 20 that next phase of development comes in. That is 21 will be something to be looked at. 22 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Okay. 23 And the -- the last thing is the walkway. The 24 Hackensack River Walkway. And there's a piece in -- 25 you know, in the Loral Hill Park that's somewhat - 177 - 1 missing. So I think we would like you to continue 2 that so that it just makes it, you know, full 3 connection. Not leave a gap of some kind. So we 4 would like you to finish that. 5 MR. O'CONNOR: I think with the 6 County's permission, the developer would love to -- 7 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 8 MR. O'CONNOR: -- make those -- 9 but it's the County's property. We'd need your 10 permission. 11 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yes. 12 MR. O'CONNOR: Certainly, it's 13 not a big deal. It's a couple of feet. 14 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 15 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 16 Edwin, do you have any comments from Medina? 17 MR. REIMON: Yes. The comments 18 I make are in bold in the -- in the letter from 19 Medina Consultants that you have on top here. 20 Basically, the generic comments have been addressed. 21 There is one minor issue that I want to point out. 22 And is the fact that the existing sidewalk along New 23 County Road is -- is in fair condition and probably 24 as the attorney just mentioned, the project is going 25 to take about ten years to be completed. I believe - 178 - 1 it's appropriate at this time to say that, as the 2 further progress, the sidewalk along New County Road 3 should be replaced with a new concrete sidewalk and 4 probably also curb. That as far as the generic 5 comments. Regarding the drainage comments. I 6 just -- only one item that hasn't been fully 7 addressed. And it's the compatibility between the 8 drainage report and the details that were provided 9 to us. I believe that my staffing in our office has 10 been in contact with the engineers. We are 11 expecting to get a new set of drawings for the 12 details. In reference to traffic, the county chair 13 just mentioned that the traffic issues should be -- 14 as I mentioned in my letter, should be on hold until 15 we get the statements of the -- for the reports on 16 the Municipal Commission, regarding the fair share 17 for the development. It is very important to us to 18 see what is going to come out of that report, at 19 least being prepared by a consultant to the 20 personnel's commission, how much is going to be 21 the -- the fair share to -- to the developer. Also 22 I would like to state that this actually, what you 23 see in front of you are the response or our final 24 review of what has been given to us. I have one 25 more comment. And I guess, is not stated in this - 179 - 1 letter because is -- only because we had another 2 meeting after we issued this letter. And it's in 3 reference to the traffic as striking plan. I 4 mention at the last meeting that I would like to see 5 the traffic as striking plan for the extension of 6 New County Road. That address the issue that we 7 have two lanes going out towards County Road -- 8 toward New County Road from extension of New County 9 Road. And -- and the striking plan that we have 10 doesn't reflect the two lanes with a taper, 11 striping, from one lane to two lanes. Now, that is 12 probably a minor issue for -- probably for the civil 13 engineer. For the traffic engineers I think it's 14 very relevant that we must try properly the taper 15 between one lane to two lanes. And actually, the 16 engineers should a new plan to us to address this 17 issue. That's all I have to say. 18 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: If I 19 can add to that, you know, I know that's in a phase 20 one part of the project that I remember that a 21 sidewalk and the curve along the New County Road 22 extension that would be a plan submitted to the 23 County -- 24 MR. REIMON: We've received no 25 plan. - 180 - 1 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right, 2 right. 3 MR. REIMON: The plans are being 4 addressed, yes. 5 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yeah. 6 Right. But there's a -- you know, approval is 7 necessary from our office to permits and we would 8 have to do an ordinance for the left turn lane, for 9 additional lanes for the Cou -- for Freehold. So 10 there's a number of things we got to do before we 11 actually do it. 12 MR. REIMON: Yes, that's right. 13 MR. CASCINO: Just to answer one 14 of your points. We have proposed replacing all the 15 sidewalk that runs along County Road extension and 16 the curbing. So we'll have a five foot sidewalk, a 17 new curb, landscaping and the lights, five feet of 18 sidewalk and then more landscaping all along the 19 County Road. And tying it into the existing -- 20 existing sidewalk on County -- on actually County 21 Road not County Road extension. That's what the 22 plan shows. 23 MR. REIMON: Yeah. That's what 24 you have on the people section too. 25 MR. CASCINO: Yes. - 181 - 1 MR. REIMON: That's correct. 2 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Mr. 3 Chairman, I have a question. Mr. Medina, when you 4 referred to New County Road what -- 5 MR. REIMON: Well, that is -- 6 it's called County Road Extension and New County 7 Road. 8 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: It's 9 a -- let me correct that one. It's New County Road 10 Extension, right? 11 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Right. 12 That's what -- 13 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: There's 14 New County Road Extension and then there's New 15 County Road. 16 MR. REIMON: Now New County 17 Road, right. Yeah. 18 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 19 MR.REIMON: So there's -- 20 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: But 21 it's -- 22 MR. REIMON: -- one that has the 23 word extension and one without the word extension. 24 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Okay. 25 So -- - 182 - 1 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: When 2 you go out County Road past the post office. 3 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Right. 4 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: They're 5 talking about the part if you go left at the end. 6 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Okay. 7 That's what I -- I was -- I didn't understand. 8 Okay. Thank you. 9 MR. REIMON: I was talking about 10 the location. 11 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Right. 12 Okay. No, but I also wanted to know if that was a 13 new street. I wasn't -- you know, a new road. 14 MR. REIMON: I get confused. 15 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: So it's 16 just -- it's the same one and you're just 17 identifying with -- okay. 18 MR. REIMON: No. When I make 19 reference to the sidewalk, they already -- they 20 already agreed to give us a new sidewalk along the 21 extension. 22 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Okay. 23 MR. REIMON: Right. Now, the 24 other road that is -- 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Edwin, you - 183 - 1 need to speak into the microphone. 2 MR. REIMON: The New County 3 Road -- New County Road has a sidewalk that is, I 4 would say, in fair condition. And in three year, 5 five, six year from now, that sidewalk is going to 6 be so deteriorated that it needs to be -- it will 7 need to be replaced. And I want to point out again 8 that I think it's appropriate that the developer 9 take that into consideration, and as the project 10 progress the sidewalk be replaced. All the way down 11 to the -- to the entrance to the park. 12 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Mr. 13 Chairman? What phase are you anticipating him doing 14 it? 15 MR. REIMON: Well, that is going 16 to be actually to the recollection of conversation 17 we have in the last -- last meeting, I would say 18 phase two. Don't forget, phase one is going to be 19 just building C. Phase two, they still have to 20 decide how many buildings. Remember that they have 21 some issues about commercial, how much they can 22 build as far as commercial based on the law as 23 presented here in the Municipal Commission. So in 24 phase two, I think it's going to be -- when they're 25 going to be able to do the sidewalk along New County - 184 - 1 Road. 2 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: And when 3 do you anticipate phase two to be start? 4 MR. O'CONNOR: So it's picked 5 up, phase two -- 6 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: The 7 point I'm making is if -- 8 MR. O'CONNOR: -- about a year 9 away from applications. 10 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: The 11 point I'm making is if you put a new sidewalk in a 12 year or two and the whole project is going to be 13 done in ten years. That means when it's done you're 14 going to have to put another sidewalk. So, I mean, 15 I guess you've got to measure. 16 MR. O'CONNOR: I humbly suggest 17 that when we come into phase two, we look at the 18 sidewalk and see if it needs to be done. 19 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Right. I 20 agree. 21 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: But 22 much shorter. 23 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Any other 24 questions? Do I have a motion? 25 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'll - 185 - 1 make a motion to approve this application. 2 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: I'll 3 second. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 5 there is a motion made by Commissioner Bettinger and 6 seconded by Commissioned Avagliano to approve 7 application SD-61-06. Commissioner Arencibia? 8 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 9 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 10 Avagliano? 11 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 12 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 13 Bettinger? 14 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 15 It looks like a wonderful application. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 17 Fitzgibbons? 18 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 19 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 20 Holloway? 21 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Commission Ng? 23 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman Choffo? 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote, aye. And good - 186 - 1 luck. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, motion 3 passed. 4 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: It's an 5 exciting project. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, the part 7 of the application is SP-31-07. That's the site 8 plan application for Fraternity Meadows, LLC. New 9 County Road, block 5, lots, 3 and 5 in Secaucus 10 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Okay. 11 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Motion to 12 approve. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. 14 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: I 15 second. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 17 our motion to approve application SP-31-07 made by 18 Commissioner Holloway and second by Commissioner 19 Fitzgibbons. Commissioner Arencibia? 20 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 21 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 22 Avagliano? 23 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 25 Bettinger? - 187 - 1 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 3 Fitzgibbons? 4 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 6 Holloway? 7 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 9 Ng? 10 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 12 Choffo? 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote, aye. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 15 the motion passed. 16 MR. O'CONNOR: Thank you 17 gentlemen. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 19 the next application scheduled for public hearing is 20 SP-33-07, Allegro Sanitation Corp. Located at 278 21 Secaucus Road, block 62, lot 7.01 in Secaucus. 22 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Mr. 23 Chairman? 24 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Yes. 25 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Due to - 188 - 1 the fact that the applicant deals with the Hudson 2 County Improvement Authority who I'm employed with, 3 I'm going to excuse myself. 4 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 5 MR. CASCINO: Thank you, 6 Commissioner Holloway. 7 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: Mr. 8 Cascino, I believe. 9 MR. CASCINO: Yes, good evening. 10 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: How are 11 you? 12 MR. CASCINO: My name is George 13 Cascino, engineer -- (indiscernible, talking over 14 mike) -- in relation to the application for site 15 approval of the Hudson County Planning Board. 16 COMMISSIONER CALVANICO: I think 17 we can consider Mr. Cascino. His being sworn in 18 already. 19 MR. CASCINO: Thank you. Again, 20 I represent Allegro Sanitation Company. And with me 21 tonight in the audience, if need be, is the 22 president of Allegro Sanitation, Steven Milano and 23 other representatives from Allegro Sanitation if 24 there's any questions about the general operations 25 of their facility or any questions you might have. - 189 - 1 Allegro owns four acres of property in Secaucus -- 2 fronting on Secaucus Road. They've been there with 3 their operations since the late '60s. In the late 4 '70s they were one of the first transfer station 5 recycling facilities licensed by the State of New 6 Jersey. They received their license by the DEP back 7 in, I believe, 1978. They've been operating at this 8 site in Secaucus in a building and under the 9 regulations of both the DEP and the Meadowlands 10 Commissions since the late '70s. They determined 11 about a year and a half ago to expand their 12 operations from ninety-five tons per daily to five 13 hundred tons per day. In order to do that, for a 14 transfer station recycling facilities you have to go 15 through many, many steps. Very quickly, they 16 received approval from the Meadowlands Commission as 17 well as the Solid Waste Management Plan and they 18 received approval from the Meadowlands Commission of 19 their site plan under the zoning regulations. They 20 have received approval so far from the Hudson, 21 Wessix, Passaic, soil conservation district. And 22 their application before the DEP, which is one of 23 the key permits you need to operate a solid waste 24 facility in New Jersey is under review. It's been 25 submitted and will be probably take about nine - 190 - 1 months to a year before it's formally approved. In 2 the meanwhile, we went before the Hudson County 3 Planning Board because we fall on the County Road. 4 So I'll briefly describe what they're proposing to 5 do. The existing building where they've been 6 operating for the last thirty years is located in 7 the center of a four acre site in which they have a 8 maintenance garage and they do indoor processing and 9 ship out residue, recyclable material, and bailed 10 residue from their site. In order to better service 11 their customers, which are mainly located in Hudson 12 County, they determined to expand their facility. 13 In order to expand their facility, they're actually 14 building a bigger boat. The boat is a 7700 square 15 foot addition to the site. That's covered in here 16 in grey. The addition to the building will house a 17 bailing facility, a new loading dock to take out 18 those bails, as well as new indoor loading 19 facilities to load residue into the site that isn't 20 recycled. In essence, all the operations of the 21 transfer station, or resource recovery today, must 22 be done indoors. That's State law. The reason 23 they're putting the addition on is to make sure that 24 the additional four hundred tons per daily they want 25 to handle are all done indoors. The other major - 191 - 1 improvement they're doing at this site, in order to 2 handle the additional trucks, they're proposing an 3 additional scale. You must weight waste coming in 4 and going out under state law. So they have an 5 existing scale today located about a couple hundred 6 feet back from Secaucus Road. And they'll be adding 7 a new scale onto the site to accommodate the trucks. 8 In order to get to the new scale, the new scale will 9 be for all incoming trucks, and the old scale will 10 be used predominately for out going trucks. In 11 order to accommodate the new scaling, we want to 12 widen our curve cut with County Road. That's what 13 got us here to being with. Okay. We want to widen 14 our curve cut into County Road about twelve feet. 15 So that we can have an exclusive drive in lane to 16 get to the truck scale. There's room on site to cue 17 about six vehicles. One on the scale, four on our 18 site, and four in the driveway. So we have room to 19 cue six incoming trucks without any backup onto 20 Secaucus Road. 21 In your engineer's comment letters, there 22 were two separate comment letters, the first one 23 dealt -- he wanted assurances that we weren't going 24 to have any detrimental impact on the county 25 drainage facilities. All of our water drains to the - 192 - 1 rear of the site, into a Penhorn Creek. When we get 2 down, the same amount of water will continue to 3 drain into Penhorn Creek, because we're not 4 increasing the impervious. So whatever we have 5 today, we'll have the same amount of impervious in 6 the future. All of our drainage water goes through 7 a storm scepter before dis -- it treats for the 8 quality of the water before it goes to Penhorn 9 Creek. 10 The second key item in your 11 engineer letter to us, had to do with traffic. 12 There was some concern about truck trips into the 13 site. And I responded in writing to him last week. 14 To summarize, the essence of his concern was this. 15 He wanted to make sure that we had enough cuing 16 space to handle the maximum trucks that are going to 17 be coming into the site. By some calculations which 18 I've presented to him, lifted from our traffic 19 engineering report, worse case scenario, peek hour 20 of the day, and one of our scales is broken -- I 21 can't make anything up any worse than that, because 22 we have the ability to use both scales. But lets 23 suppose one was broken and we only have the incoming 24 scale, biggest peek hour of the day, we'd have 25 fourteen garbage trucks that would arrive at this - 193 - 1 site to dump their waste or their recyclables. 2 Fourteen trucks, sixty minutes, that's about four 3 minutes to weight each truck even if we didn't have 4 any cuing. Four minutes per truck is more than 5 adequate to get that truck onto the scale, weighted, 6 and back into the facility. That was one of the 7 main concerns that he had. And hopefully I've 8 answered his question in writing enough and I've 9 summarized what the impacts would be. So beyond 10 that, if there's any other questions, I'll be happy 11 to answer them for you. 12 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I do have a 13 question. At the site plan subcommittee meeting -- 14 I'm not doubting you, Mr. Cascino, I'm just tired, 15 there's no impact on Penhorn Creek facility? 16 MR. CASCINO: As a result of the 17 comments at the -- at the hearing, we went back and 18 we revised the site plan. In fact, we had a slight 19 increase of five hundred square feet of impervious. 20 Because it of the comments at the subcommittee 21 meeting, we got rid of that. 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: All right. 23 MR. CASCINO: And we chopped to 24 some pavement and we proposed additional buffer 25 areas that would just get us equal to what the - 194 - 1 impervious area is today. Then we submitted 2 calculations to TNN that showed what the run off 3 will be. That's the separate plan we submitted 4 called, Storm Water Management Plan. And it showed 5 what, for the four acre site that we would have 6 about twenty-five cubic feet per second of water 7 from the one hundred year storm discharged into 8 Penhorn Creek. The same amount we have today. 9 There would be no increase into the water, into 10 Penhorn Creek. 11 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Mr. 12 Chairman, I think we still are looking for a 13 contribution towards the new pump station of -- I 14 think we were trying to figure that, 25,000 or 15 something like that. 16 MR. CASCINO: That's correct. 17 The letter from the County suggested the 18 contribution to the -- I guess it's to Penhorn Creek 19 Pump Station about 25,000 dollars and the client has 20 agreed and they're here to verify if you don't 21 believe me to put up that money. 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: We're happy to 23 hear that because a lot of applicants that come in 24 front of us aren't as willing as your client to 25 contribute. So we're happy to hear it. You have to - 195 - 1 come up sir, to a microphone. 2 MR. CASCINO: This is Steve 3 Milano the president of Allegro Sanitation. 4 MR. MILANO: Good evening, I'm 5 Steven Milano M-I-L-A-N-O. The question I had, it 6 said not to exceed -- 7 MR. CALVANICO: Mr. Milano, I'm 8 sorry, please -- 9 S T E V E N M I L A N O, having been first duly 10 sworn according to law, testified as follows: 11 MR. MILANO: Said not to exceed 12 25,000 and they were going to pro rate it by 13 acreage. I was just wondering, did you guys -- was, 14 like, 5,000 the last time we spoke? They were pro 15 rating it -- 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Right. 17 MR. MILANO: -- not to exceed 18 25,000 if you have, like, a hundred acres. So I 19 just want to know for four acres. 20 COMMISSION ARENCIBIA: Well, I 21 think it's going to be closer to 25,000. I mean, I 22 don't remember a -- I mean, the project still 23 ongoing. The design for that pump station. We 24 don't have figures yet for the costs. But, you 25 know, as soon as we come up with the formula, it's - 196 - 1 going to be equally distributed among all of the 2 developers. 3 MR. CASCINO: All right. I 4 just -- I know -- 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Excuse me. 6 You're right Steve, there was confusion at the 7 subcommittee meeting we asked an estimate of what it 8 would be. And at the meeting they said it would be 9 about 6,000 dollars. Okay. Subsequent to that we 10 got the letter from the County which indicated not 11 to exceed 25,000 dollars. That's where the 12 confusion's at. 13 MR. CASCINO: Mr. Chairman, I 14 don't know if this will clear it up or make it more 15 confusing. But the -- the Penhorn Creek basically, 16 the drainage basin is a very large drainage basin 17 covering portions of Secaucus, Jersey City and North 18 Bergen. The County has retained the services of TNN 19 Associates to do the designs of rehabilitations of 20 Penhorn Creek Pump Station. We asked the applicant 21 including, but not limiting to Allegro. Including 22 the Stanley Scrape Metal Recycling Facilities, the 23 other motel going in down the road, the Rockefeller 24 Center, FDP, other applicants to make a 25 contribution. I think it's only blind including - 197 - 1 that it's going to be a higher figure. And if it 2 turns out to be 6,000, then I think that's -- you 3 know, I would hate in position -- working for the 4 County, I would hate to low ball a figure and say, 5 no, it shouldn't be more than your pro rated 6 contribution shouldn't be more than 6,000 dollars. 7 And then we have to come back to you and say, well 8 it's really 8,000 dollars. And you're mad at us 9 and, you know, we're all upset. If we tell you 10 25,000 in and it turns out to be 5,000, so, you 11 know, I think that's a win-win situation. Your 12 location, this particular sudden location drains 13 directly into the Penhorn Creek. Back on the April 14 16th storm event that happened, literally, 500 feet 15 down the road from you, downhill, the road was 16 closed for several days because of severe flooding. 17 The entire area is subject to severe flooding, the 18 roadway gets shut down. We're asking the 19 developers, property owners, applicants, when they 20 come in before the board to make a reasonable 21 contribution towards rehabilitation of the pump 22 stations. So I think that's reasonable. 23 MR. MILANO: I'd be the first -- 24 you know, I don't have a problem chipping in at all. 25 I just want it to be, you know, fair, that's all. - 198 - 1 Okay. 2 MR. CASCINO: Sure. 3 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: We 4 had -- I think the motel here a couple of months 5 ago. And we -- we told them they had to chip in 6 too. They tried to -- tried to, you know, move 7 around -- 8 MR. MILANO: I don't want to 9 move around anything. I just want it to be fair. 10 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Yeah. 11 MR. MILANO: I've been there a 12 long time. I don't want to get in to what's going 13 on down there and go back. I just want to move 14 forward. But the sir reason why that water's 15 backing now and it's not because of Allegro 16 Sanitation. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: I know that. 18 Like I said, Mr. Milano, we're happy that you're -- 19 we'll ask everybody in that area help out a little 20 bit. 21 MR. MILANO: I've been helping 22 out for a long time and I don't have a problem 23 helping out now. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: All right. The flooding 25 is a regional problem unfortunately. It's not one - 199 - 1 property owner. It's -- it affects everybody within 2 the drainage space. 3 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: And 4 most of the money is going to be -- you know, County 5 is putting in a big chuck of money. And the amount 6 of commission since it's in that district will be 7 also applied money to the pump station. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Milano, 9 your contribution is probably going to be less than 10 1 percent of the total costs. So, the County is 11 picking up the largest percentage. 12 MR. MILANO: Okay. Thank you. 13 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Any questions 14 for any -- 15 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: One 16 more thing I wanted to bring up was the operation of 17 the driveway. It's a very unusual set up. You're 18 going to have, maybe you should discuss that a 19 little bit. 20 MR. CASCINO: Okay. First to 21 say that there were many hands in designing this 22 driveway and the location to scale is an 23 understatement. We're back and forth between the 24 Meadowlands Commission and myself and my staff for 25 months trying to come up with an acceptable location - 200 - 1 for the second scale. Which scale would be in, 2 which scale would be out. How would we arrange it, 3 how far back. I can' tell you we came up with this 4 location after much negotiation to accomplish the 5 following. We wanted to make sure among all other 6 things, that no trucks backed up onto Secaucus Road. 7 That was number one. Because if there's delays on 8 our site, that's our problem. If there's a delay on 9 Secaucus Road, that's your problem, and it's 10 everybody's problems. So we tried to gear it to 11 make smooth sailing coming in with a brand new 12 scale, number one. So that was the first decision. 13 Have the new scale incoming traffic. Set it as far 14 back into the property as you possibly can without 15 interfering with the doors to get into the facility. 16 That's set as far back into the property as we 17 possibly could. Then we had to make sure it stayed 18 away from the parking area on the south side of the 19 site. So it didn't restrict any of our truck 20 movements on the site. That all being said, we 21 ended up with one little window of opportunity to 22 put the scale. Just north of the existing scale 23 between the parking lot for the employees and the 24 existing scale. Just west of the first door to get 25 into the transfer station. As far east as we could - 201 - 1 to get it off Secaucus Road. When we did that, we 2 didn't think the driveway was wide enough. So what 3 we said, let's do this. Let's widen the driveway 4 and put in barriers and signage to direct -- it's 5 kind of like the English system. The English system 6 of driveways. We're going in on the left and coming 7 out on the right, rather than the normal way it's 8 done. Those trucks would be directed by signage to 9 go into an exclusive one-way driveway onto the new 10 scale. Other trucks not going to the scale would 11 still be able to come in the existing driveway as 12 well as the existing driveway being able to serve as 13 an exit from the site. So the whole idea here was 14 to come up with a design to quicken the truck 15 leaving Secaucus Road, getting to the scale so 16 there's no back-up onto the road. If we have some 17 back-ups cuing on our site before they get off, 18 that's our problem. We don't think we'll have that 19 problem. But if it is a problem, it's ours not the 20 County's. Does that explain it a little bit? 21 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yeah. 22 I just want to make sure you have this signage up, 23 the one-way signs, the do not enter signs, that kind 24 of stuff up to make sure nobody turns in to the 25 wrong site. People do it by habit, you know, they - 202 - 1 just turn on -- they drive on the right side of the 2 road. And you don't want anybody that's, like, lost 3 in the area driving into a wrong way. 4 MR. CASCINO: Well, actually 5 signage is the key. We have to make it idiot proof 6 to be honest. 7 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right, 8 right. 9 MR. CASCINO: We have a huge 10 sign on pylons that says, entrance to Allegro scale. 11 Okay. It's going to be pretty simple that this is 12 where they're going to have to go. With arrows 13 pointing the way into the entrance. By the way, the 14 other driveway will be utilized mostly by Allegro 15 vehicles. They -- this is their truck depot for 16 their solid waste vehicles. They know where to go. 17 So the people we have to gear are those members of 18 the public who have never been to this facility 19 before. Incoming trucks going to the scale. So all 20 of our signage will be geared to the entrance to the 21 Allegro scale for the newcomer. After they come 22 once or twice, they'll know where to go. But we 23 will do -- we will do signage. And we have no 24 problem working with the County engineer's office to 25 come up with acceptable signage. We don't have any - 203 - 1 pride of authorship on this. 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: All 3 right. I mean, there's a driveway and you're 4 widening it and so you'll need it to come to -- get 5 a permit from us and at that time you can -- you 6 know, get the signage and layout of the driveway and 7 submit it to us. 8 MR. CASCINO: No problems. We 9 know we have to do that. 10 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 11 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Anything else? 12 Questions? Go ahead, Steve. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 14 there is just one issue with regard to the sidewalk 15 or the crosswalk crossing the driveway, I believe. 16 Was that an issue, Mr. Klein? 17 MR. KLEIN: Oh, it was brought 18 up. I -- 19 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: 20 During -- 21 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do you 22 remember -- the striping for the pedestrian 23 sidewalk, you mean? 24 MR. SPEAKER: For the 25 pedestrian -- so how are pedestrians going to get - 204 - 1 from one end of the driveway to the other end of the 2 driveway? Is it a regular sidewalk? Or is it a 3 crosswalk across the driveway entrance? 4 MR. SPEAKER: I don't think 5 this --is there a sidewalk here? 6 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: The 7 sidewalk goes across the driveway? 8 MR. SPEAKER: Goes across. And 9 it keeps continuing. 10 MR. SPEAKER: All right. So 11 you're going to maintain -- 12 MR. SPEAKER: We can paint a 13 crosswalk. 14 MR. SPEAKER: Where? 15 MR. SPEAKER: Where the 16 driveway -- the sidewalk ends and the curve begins. 17 We can paint a crosswalk. 18 MR. SPEAKER: You can paint a 19 crosswalk. All right. 20 MR. SPEAKER: To connect the two 21 sidewalks. 22 MR. SPEAKER: All right. Okay. 23 MR. SPEAKER: Mr. Chairman, the 24 crosswalk crossing the ivory would have to be ADA 25 accessible complying with the truncated domes. With - 205 - 1 the depressed curbs. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you, 3 Steve. Anything else? Do I have a motion? 4 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Make 5 a motion. 6 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: I'll 7 second it. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 9 on a motion to approve application SP-33-07 made by 10 Commissioner Fitzgibbons, seconded by Commissioner 11 Bettinger. Commissioner Arencibia? 12 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Ms. Avagliano? 14 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 16 Bettinger? 17 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 19 Fitzgibbons? 20 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 21 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Holloway 22 is not present. Commissioner Ng? 23 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 25 Choffo? - 206 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 3 the motion passed. 4 MR. CASCINO: Thank you, 5 gentlemen. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 7 Mr. Chairman, the next application scheduled for 8 public hearing is SP-37-07 New Singular Wireless 9 PCS, located at 410 Palisade Avenue, Block 190, Lot 10 31 in Union City. 11 MR. LEVINE: Good evening. My 12 name is Michael Levine. I'm an attorney with Day 13 Pitney here on behalf of the applicant New Singular 14 Wireless. The property is an existing four-storey 15 apartment building, 410 Palisade Avenue, Block 190, 16 Lot 31. We're proposing a type of installation that 17 the board is very familiar with. It's a proposed 18 rooftop wireless telecommunications site consisting 19 of equipment cabinets and antennas mounted on the 20 roof of the existing building. I'd like -- very 21 briefly consistent with the way these are normally 22 handled to just get my engineer sworn in for him to 23 describe the equipment and the improvements that 24 we're proposing. 25 MR. CALVANICO: Please state - 207 - 1 your name and spell your last name for the record. 2 MR. SCHERER: Glen Scherer. 3 Last name is spelled S-C-H-E-R-E-R. 4 (Witness is duly sworn) 5 MR. LEVINE: We could just 6 briefly review with the board your educational 7 background and professional experience. 8 MR. SCHERER: I have a 9 Bachelor's of Science in Civil Engineering from New 10 Jersey Institute of Technology. And I'm a licensed 11 professional engineer in the State of New Jersey and 12 New York. 13 MR. LEVINE: Could you briefly 14 describe the telecommunications facility that's 15 proposed for this rooftop? 16 MR. SCHERER: This building is 17 approximately 170 feet long. On the front side of 18 the building, which fronts Palisade Avenue, Singular 19 is proposing to install eleven cabinets with a steel 20 frame and eight antennas that will be mounted to the 21 face of the building. In the rear of the building 22 there will be an additional twelve antennas on some 23 strong steel frames at the other end of the 24 building. And that's simply it. Everything's on 25 the rooftop of the building. - 208 - 1 MR. LEVINE: So would there be 2 any -- there'd be no change to the impervious 3 coverage at the site. Correct? 4 MR. SCHERER: That's correct. 5 MR. LEVINE: Is it true that 6 there would be no change in the existing drainage 7 patterns that are experienced at the site? Is this 8 an unmanned facility? 9 MR. SCHERER: Yes, it is. 10 MR. LEVINE: How often are 11 maintenance visits made to this type of 12 installation? Like once a month, once every six 13 weeks? Just a few hours. Has your office conducted 14 a preliminary structural analysis to confirm that 15 the building can support the loads that are proposed 16 by this installation? 17 MR. SCHERER: Yes, sir. We 18 have. 19 MR. LEVINE: Any questions that 20 the board members may have with respect to my 21 engineer? 22 MR. HOLLOWAY: Yes. 23 MR. LEVINE: Go ahead. 24 MR. HOLLOWAY: Mr. Chairman, I 25 think you might have answered it, but one of the - 209 - 1 concerns is of the board was the weight of the 2 equipment on that building. Would it be able to 3 hold it? 4 MR. SCHERER: The building 5 itself can definitely hold it. And we have done 6 this analysis months ago and a conceptual design. 7 The cabinets front part of the building along 8 Palisade Avenue. Between the cabinets and the steel 9 we're looking at maybe 15-16,000 pounds. And in 10 back of the building you see these three groups of 11 antennas. Each one of those groups is -- with steel 12 and the antennas altogether -- is maybe say 700 13 pounds. So the total load that would be on the back 14 of this building would be approximately 2,000/2,100 15 pounds. 16 COMMISSIONER CHOFFO: Go ahead, 17 Stephen. Can you just refresh the board's memory? 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Sure. 19 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: What happened 20 with the building itself? 21 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 22 most of the telecommunications applications have 23 been declared exempt. This particular property -- 24 the storm event back on April 16th of this year had 25 caused the lapse of a retaining wall onto the south - 210 - 1 wing of the viaduct. And I believe this property 2 was actually -- I believe the building was evacuated 3 or closed. So it is at the Site Planning 4 Subdivision Review Committee. We had discussed and 5 asked the -- and included into the comment letter 6 for this evening's meeting just for the applicant to 7 bring a structural engineer to come out just to 8 testify that the building can withstand the weight, 9 given the -- I guess the circumstances of the storm 10 event and I think the fear was that the collapse of 11 the retaining wall had somehow undermined the 12 structure of this building. So we just wanted to 13 make sure before we put 15,000 more pounds of dead 14 weight onto the roof that everything is all right. 15 MR. LEVINE: Could I just -- you 16 had testified there, Glen, that there had been a 17 preliminary conceptual analysis that had been done 18 months ago. I should point out to the board that 19 our application was only submitted to Union City 20 last month. So we've not yet had our hearing yet 21 before the Board of Adjustment, which will be 22 forthcoming over the next month or two. If the 23 Board of Adjustment in Union City were to grant an 24 approval to this application, as part of getting a 25 construction permit would you then -- after the - 211 - 1 fact, after the approval and after this recent -- 2 the Nor'easter in mid April -- do a detailed 3 structural analysis to confirm that the building can 4 accommodate the equipment. You know, looking at the 5 building itself. 6 MR. SCHERER: I just recently 7 got this information today about the failure of the 8 wall. Literally, not to spend a lot of time out in 9 the field. We're doing the investigation with 10 accounting to see what the prepareds were. We did a 11 preliminary investigation not know that there was a 12 retaining wall failure. Which is approximately, 13 from what I estimate, a few feet or so from the back 14 of the building. I don't know the level of it. I 15 don't know the depth down to the viaduct. There's 16 some unknowns that I honestly don't know. I mean 17 the loads that I am talking about here are -- 18 (Indiscernible due to static) -- like some time or 19 some investigation negative. Talked to the County 20 to see what they've done and see what's going on. 21 Because I haven't been back to the building since 22 then, and I don't -- I can't necessarily say a 23 hundred percent. I mean, common sense would tell 24 you 2,100 pounds -- the back portion of that 25 building, like the several hundred thousand - 212 - 1 pounds -- our increase is very minor in nature. But 2 given the circumstances and me not knowing exactly 3 everything I couldn't -- 4 MR. SPEAKER: Generally -- 5 MR. SPEAKER: I think I'll show 6 you this. 7 MR. SCHERER: -- put this 8 analysis together. 9 MR. SPEAKER: Let me show you 10 some photos. 11 MR. SPEAKER: Okay. 12 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: The reason we 13 had you come in front of us was because of the fact 14 that the building was evacuated and it's been 15 monitored, so we're concerned about, obviously, that 16 weight on a building. 17 MR. HOLLOWAY: We're just 18 concerned about the integrity of the building 19 itself. 20 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: I think 21 what you should do -- I mean I was going to suggest 22 let Union City approve it and a construction 23 official get the permits and then come back to us. 24 If the construction official who's a licensed -- 25 he's going to ask for an engineer report anyway on - 213 - 1 that building. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I just want to 3 make sure I understand you. I'm not sure where you 4 would be able to get a building permit from the 5 construction official -- 6 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: 7 Without. 8 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: -- unless he 9 was shown that we had county planning board 10 approval. 11 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: No. If 12 you have local -- 13 MR. LEVINE: You mean from the 14 Board of Investments? 15 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yes. 16 Then you could come back to us. 17 MR. LEVINE: So would you feel 18 more comfortable then if we had local Board of 19 Adjustments -- 20 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yes. 21 MR. LEVINE: -- approval before 22 you granted an approval? Is that what you're 23 saying? 24 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I think the 25 board as a whole would -- - 214 - 1 MR. SPEAKER: Unless. 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: May I 3 add, Mr. Chairman, that sure the problem is the city 4 engineer for Union City. And they were out there 5 when this collapse happened. And made a decision to 6 evacuate the building. And they were monitoring the 7 building with surveyors for a period of time. And 8 I'm not sure if they're still doing it. But there 9 was concern about movement of the building. So 10 Ralph Tango is the engineer with that firm that was 11 overseeing that. So I think you ought to contact 12 him just to confirm. And then with the Union City 13 construction official to see if this can work out. 14 The county's concern is the retaining wall. It 15 collapsed. It's maybe fifty to sixty feet behind 16 the building. And it's unstable. We just don't 17 know, you know, what's going to happen. So our 18 concern is how are you going to place the equipment. 19 You know, we definitely don't want any heavy 20 equipment in the back of that building. Because 21 it's just soil that's sitting on top there, and it's 22 not really retained by the wall any more. So -- and 23 I know a lot of times you bring in heavy cranes if 24 it's a tall building to place the equipment. 25 MR. SCHERER: It's not really - 215 - 1 the -- 2 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: That's 3 up in the front. 4 MR. SCHERER: Both of the loads 5 are at the front -- at the other end of the 6 building? 7 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 8 MR. SCHERER: There is some very 9 minor modes, but I mean it's still a concern itself. 10 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 11 Right. 12 MR. SCHERER: You know, this is 13 the first time I'm -- 14 MR. SPEAKER: Excuse me. Mr. 15 Marks, right? Give you some. Some homework. 16 MR. SCHERER: It's all that 17 debris on the other side of the road. My mouth 18 tends to drop. 19 MR. LEVINE: We certainly hear 20 what you're saying. And that's why we're willing to 21 agree to proceed in that way. I just -- and it may 22 be clear already -- I just want you to be aware that 23 the retaining wall -- it was on a separate lot. 24 Behind, you know, our -- between the subject 25 property and the viaduct. That's not under the same - 216 - 1 ownership as our lot. 2 MR. SPEAKER: Okay. 3 MR. LEVINE: So we're not 4 dealing with the same property owner and the same 5 land board, but that doesn't mean it's not an issue. 6 We understand that. But I just did want to make 7 sure that the board was aware of that fact. 8 MR. SPEAKER: All right. 9 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Anyway, 10 the retaining wall is the county's property. And we 11 have a piece of right-of-way behind that to -- 12 MR. LEVINE: Behind that block? 13 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 14 It's just right behind this building. 15 MR. LEVINE: Right. 16 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: And if 17 you saw this during that big storm it was like 18 waterfall. Coming down. 19 MR. LEVINE: You know, I think 20 when we got the letter and we were talking about -- 21 I almost think I have a recollection of that being a 22 story in the local news. 23 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: It was 24 on television. It made national news, because my 25 parents in Florida told me about it. - 217 - 1 MR. LEVINE: So if I understand 2 you, then what we should do is kind of table this 3 for the time being and proceed with our efforts to 4 get municipal approval from the Board of Adjustment. 5 And if and when that were to happen then we would 6 notify you folks and be put on the next agenda and 7 come back at that point? 8 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Well 9 actually -- go ahead, Stephen. 10 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 11 in addition to local approval I would ask the 12 applicant to submit a structural analysis just for 13 our comfort level. 14 MR. LEVINE: All right. 15 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Of the 16 building, you mean? 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Of the 18 building, sure. Of the equipment's effect on the 19 building. 20 MR. SCHERER: I need to talk 21 with the shore department. I mean, there needs to 22 be some coordination -- 23 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 24 MR. SCHERER: -- here. I mean 25 that structurally usually leads into one thing, it - 218 - 1 leads to another, you know, it's going to lead into 2 a geotechnical investigation of the wall, basically, 3 is where it's going to bring us. So it's a bit of a 4 pickle then. 5 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Right. 6 It's unusual, because of what's happened. You know 7 they don't get this. But because -- 8 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: You 9 picked the wrong building. 10 MR. SPEAKER: Yeah. 11 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Yeah. 12 Right. 13 MR. LEVINE: We should have been 14 here before April. 15 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: All 16 right. So unless there's anything further what 17 we'll do is we'll reach out to shore department and 18 Mr. Tango and find out -- to get a better handle on 19 what they're doing and proceed at the municipal 20 level, and then once that's done, you know, we'll 21 check in to make sure that we have available to 22 submit the information that you feel you need and 23 then we'll go from there. 24 MR. SPEAKER: Then we'll do our 25 best to get you on as quick as possible. - 219 - 1 MR. LEVINE: We appreciate that. 2 MR. SPEAKER: Right. 3 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Let me 4 make a motion to table. 5 MR. HOLLOWAY: Motion to table. 6 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Oh. 7 I'll second it. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 9 I have a motion to table application SP-37-07 made 10 by Commissioner Holloway, seconded by Commissioner 11 Bettinger. Commissioner Arencibia? 12 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 13 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 15 Avagliano? 16 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 18 Bettinger? 19 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 21 Fitzgibbons? 22 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 24 Holloway? 25 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. - 220 - 1 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 2 Ng? 3 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 4 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 5 Choffo? 6 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 7 MR. SPEAKER: Thank you very 8 much. 9 MR. SPEAKER: Thank you. 10 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 11 the next application scheduled for public hearing is 12 SD-39-07, Bayonne Residential Limited located at 13 Peninsula at Bayonne Bay, Block 404.15, Lot 1 in 14 Bayonne. 15 MR. EBNER: Good evening, Mr. 16 Chairman, commissioners. My name is Ken Ebner, from 17 the law firm of Neske and Associates. We represent 18 the applicant. The matter before the board this 19 evening is the application for subdivision approval. 20 The site plan approval. Our review is exempt as 21 this proposed development does not impact any county 22 road or drainage facility. I have here -- excuse 23 me, one other thing. The City of Bayonne -- this 24 matter -- both the site plan and the subdivision 25 were approved by The City of Bayonne on April 10, - 221 - 1 2007. I have with me this evening a representative 2 from the developer Trammell Crow, and well as my 3 engineer and surveyor. And we'll bring up Mr. 4 Shorter first from Trammell Crow. He'll just give 5 the board a brief overview of the project. If you 6 have any questions at hand he'll be glad to answer 7 them. 8 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Please state 9 your name and last name for the record. 10 MR. SHORTER: Michael Shorter. 11 S-H-O-R-T-E-R. 12 (Witness is duly sworn) 13 MR. SHORTER: Thanks a lot. 14 I've come this evening just to give you a brief 15 overview on the project. We are located on the 16 peninsula of Bayonne Harbor, formerly Lot B or 17 Marine Ocean Terminal in Bayonne. We're located 18 about half a mile in or out rather from Route 440 19 towards New York City. Our development is in the 20 Bayonne Bay district as adopted by the redevelopment 21 plan of Bayonne. We are one of two developers in 22 the Bayonne Bay district. We represent two blocks 23 that we are asking for permission to make a 24 subdivision this evening, comprising about seven and 25 a half acres. The remainder of the Bayonne Bay - 222 - 1 district, roughly twenty-eight acres, is with 2 Atlantic Realty or commonly referred to as Bayonne 3 Bay Developers. We, Trammell Crow, intend to 4 develop about 545 rental units on these two blocks. 5 325 units on the southern block. 220 on the 6 northern block. The development is going to be a 7 four-storey wood structure. And we're planning to 8 hit the ground in about September of this year. We 9 will have a co-obligation. We have made a fair 10 share obligation to the County through the Bayonne 11 Local Redevelopment Authority. We have some fair 12 share obligation to the city in which we've come to 13 an agreement with them as well. In the early part 14 of this year we were deemed consistent with the 15 overriding redevelopment plan by the Bayonne Local 16 Redevelopment Authority Board, and, as stated 17 before, we do have site plan and subdivision 18 approval from the city. We are currently into the 19 DEP for consistency with the Bayonne Local 20 Redevelopment Authorities Waterfront Development 21 Permit, which was issued to the Bayonne Local 22 Redevelopment Authority approximately two years ago. 23 If there's no further questions for me I'll bring up 24 my surveyor and he can answer any questions you may 25 have. - 223 - 1 MR. RAMANO: Good evening again. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Could you just 3 state your name again for the record. 4 MR. RAMANO: Joseph Ramano, a 5 professional land surveyor in charge of land 6 surveying services and lighting and engineering. 7 MR. CALVANICO: Mr. Ramano, 8 you're still sworn from earlier this evening. 9 MR. RAMANO: Still sworn. Okay. 10 I think Mike said it all. I did prepare the plan. 11 Again, it's one large lot being subdivided into 12 three small -- two smaller and one larger remaining 13 lot, with the proposed development being on the 14 western two lots. I believe it's three -- 2.6 acres 15 and 4.7 acres. The remainder, I believe, to stay 16 vacant. 17 MR. SPEAKER: It's going from 18 one lot to three? 19 MR. RAMANO: It's going from one 20 to three, with these new additional roads. Hudson 21 Place, South Park Avenue and they're calling this 22 one Parkside Street. In general, from this one 23 large configuration to these three. 24 MR. SHORTER: The roads are 25 actually unnamed. They're just listed as listed in - 224 - 1 the redevelopment plan. The city will, at some 2 point, vote upon the names of the road, adopt them. 3 Redevelopment agency is going to building the 4 infrastructure. At that point, when the 5 infrastructure is complete, they will turn it over 6 to the city. 7 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Mr. 8 Chairman, where is this actually located? I know in 9 Bayonne. I'm awake for that part, but where in 10 Bayonne? 11 MR. SHORTER: This is the US 12 MOTBY facility. 13 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Okay. 14 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: It's in the -- 15 I guess, southwest corner of the whole facility. 16 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Okay. 17 Thank you. 18 MR. SHORTER: It's southwest of 19 the New Jersey Turnpike interchange 14A. Down on 20 440. 21 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: All 22 right. 23 MR. SPEAKER: I know where that 24 is. 25 MR. SHORTER: If you entered - 225 - 1 south, before you're -- 2 MR. SPEAKER: Yeah. 3 MR. SHORTER: -- halfway down by 4 the -- 5 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: It's 6 like by the movie theater? In that area? 7 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Yes. 8 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Okay. 9 That's what I just wanted to -- 10 MR. SPEAKER: Okay. 11 MR. SPEAKER: By South Cove 12 Commons. 13 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Right. 14 That's it. 15 MR. SHORTER: Directly across 16 from South Cove Commons. 17 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Okay. 18 Thank you. 19 MR. EBNER: Any questions for 20 the surveyor? 21 MR. SPEAKER: I don't -- 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Commissioner 23 Arencibia? 24 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: No. 25 MR. SPEAKER: I don't have - 226 - 1 anything else. I know this is a part of the multi- 2 phasing project -- 3 MR. SPEAKER: Yes, it is. 4 MR. SPEAKER: -- so they've been 5 here before and-- 6 MR. SPEAKER: Yes. This is a 7 multi-phase where you're going to do multiple 8 subdivisions? 9 MR. SHORTER: We are not. The 10 city is. Already, you've probably seen Roseland 11 Fidelco for the Harvest Station project. Which is 12 actually to the west of us, and located along Route 13 440. We're in a half mile. We're on the western 14 portion of the Bayonne Bay District. 15 MR. SPEAKER: Yeah. 16 MR. SHORTER: The large portion, 17 I'm assuming, you'll see probably in the near future 18 as Bayonne Bay Developers are commonly Atlantic 19 Realty will come in for subdivision further phases 20 of the project. 21 MR. EBNER: Does the board have 22 any questions for the engineer? Do you regard him 23 to testify as anything? 24 MR. SPEAKER: No. 25 MR. SPEAKER: I don't think so. - 227 - 1 MR. SPEAKER: No. 2 MR. SPEAKER: It doesn't -- 3 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: No offense, 4 but no, we don't. Do I have a motion? 5 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: I 6 make a motion to approve. 7 MR. HOLLOWAY: I second it. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 9 on a motion to approve application SD-39-07 made by 10 Commissioner Fitzgibbons, second by Commissioner 11 Holloway. Commissioner Arencibia? 12 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 13 SECRETARY MARKS: Ms. Avagliano? 14 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 16 Bettinger? 17 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 18 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 19 Fitzgibbons? Commissioner Holloway? 20 MR. HOLLOWAY: Aye. 21 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 22 Ng? 23 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 24 SECRETARY MARKS: And Chairman 25 Choffo? - 228 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Aye. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Good luck. 3 MR. EBNER: All right. Thank 4 you very much. One final request of the board. If 5 I may send in the plaques for a signature before you 6 memorialize the resolution next month? Would that 7 be a problem? 8 MR. SPEAKER: Sure. 9 MR. SPEAKER: We know we can do 10 it? 11 MR. SPEAKER: Okay. 12 MR. EBNER: All right. Thank 13 you very much. 14 MR. SPEAKER: Thank you. 15 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you. 16 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 17 the last application scheduled for public hearing is 18 SD-42-07, Robert O'Neill applicant, located at 17-19 19 Winfield Avenue, which is Block 1431, Lot 17 in 20 Jersey City. 21 MR. NAVAL: Good evening. I'll 22 make this brief. My name is Emmanuel Naval. 23 N-A-V-A-L. I'm with Ingles Architecture, and I'm 24 representing a client Bob O'Neill. 25 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Thank you for - 229 - 1 being patient tonight. 2 MR. NAVAL: The project involves 3 the restoration of a historic bank storage facility 4 located at the corner of Winfield and Princeton 5 Avenue in the green section of Jersey City. It's 6 been indicate -- we're going to add -- here's -- I 7 don't know if you guys have copies of these plans? 8 But here's part of the existing building, which has 9 a three-storey portion and a two-storey portion. 10 We're going to add a storey to the two-storey 11 portion, and across the hall on top of the building 12 we're also going to add a penthouse. So the bank's 13 storage facility will be combined with this and the 14 quarter portion of the lot will be divided to three 15 lots with two-family townhouses on them. And I have 16 a picture of the site plan. I'm sorry I have no 17 easel, but -- 18 MR. SPEAKER: Put it there. 19 MR. NAVAL: -- big building and 20 then the three lots for the two-family houses. We 21 received planning board planning approval already, 22 earlier this year. I think it was in January. 23 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Which street 24 is that that the three-family -- the three -- 25 MR. NAVAL: The three two- - 230 - 1 families ground sides will be on Princeton Avenue. 2 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: So -- 3 MR. NAVAL: And the large 4 building has nine apartments and will have nine 5 parking spaces within the building. The two-family 6 houses will have two parking spaces each house. The 7 current cuts are existing, and we're not on a county 8 road. So we're all set. 9 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Is 10 that the bank that was in the paper? 11 MR. NAVAL: Yes. This was in 12 the Jersey Journal last Thursday. And John Gomez, 13 who just -- who spoke earlier -- he wrote the 14 article. 15 MR. SPEAKER: I had a question. 16 I just forgot. 17 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: You said -- 18 I'm sorry -- you did say Jersey City granted you 19 approval? 20 MR. NAVAL: Yes. Plan and water 21 approval already. 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Any questions? 23 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: 24 Doesn't infringe upon a county road or anything 25 so -- - 231 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do I have a 2 motion to approve? 3 MR. HOLLOWAY: Motion to 4 approve. 5 MR. NG: Second. 6 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 7 I have a motion to approve application SD-42-07 made 8 by Commissioner Holloway, second by Commissioner Ng. 9 Commissioner Arencibia? 10 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 12 Avagliano? 13 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 15 Bettinger? 16 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 18 Fitzgibbons? 19 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 21 Holloway? 22 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 23 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 24 Ng? 25 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. - 232 - 1 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 2 Choffo? 3 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 4 Good luck. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 6 in an effort to basically clean up the back 7 applications of matters that haven't moved since 8 they've been submitted by the applicants we've added 9 a new category on the agenda which was properly 10 advertised. There's nobody here to testify, but I 11 would like the board to basically run their seal of 12 approval to dismissing these applications. These 13 applications -- I could either do separately or 14 together. These applications were submitted by the 15 applicants, and because they either were of chaste 16 environmental constraints or were in mediation or 17 were denied or given conditional approvals by the 18 municipal planning board or zoning board, they just 19 haven't moved forward, nor for the foreseeable 20 future were going forward. The life of the 21 application -- when an applicant signs our 22 application, the life of the application is one 23 year. But I just want to rest it easy. Public 24 advertisement, public hearing process to dismiss 25 them before -- - 233 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I would 2 suggest reading each one individually. 3 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. 4 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I mean we 5 could vote on them as a block, right? You'll just 6 read them individually? 7 SECRETARY MARKS: Okay. So for 8 the application scheduled to be dismissed at 9 tonight's meeting. It's first SP-22-06, McDonalds 10 Corporation, located at 7108 Kennedy Boulevard, 11 which is Block 264, Lot 2.01 in North Bergen. 12 SD/SP-58-06, James Adinolfi, applicant, located at 13 1615 Kennedy Boulevard, which is Block 1256.5, Lot A 14 in Jersey City. And finally, SP-66-06 Willow Avenue 15 Hoboken, LLC, located at 1316-1330 Willow Avenue, 16 which is Block 116, Lot 1.2 in Hoboken, New Jersey. 17 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: Do I have a 18 motion to dismiss these applications? 19 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Make 20 a motion. 21 COMMISSIONER NG: Second. 22 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 23 on a motion to dismiss these applications made by 24 Commissioner Fitzgibbons, second by Commissioner Ng. 25 Commissioner Arencibia? - 234 - 1 COMMISSIONER ARENCIBIA: Aye. 2 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 3 Avagliano? 4 COMMISSIONER AVAGLIANO: Aye. 5 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 6 Bettinger? 7 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Aye. 8 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 9 Fitzgibbons? 10 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: Aye. 11 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 12 Holloway? 13 COMMISSIONER HOLLOWAY: Aye. 14 SECRETARY MARKS: Commissioner 15 Ng? 16 COMMISSIONER NG: Aye. 17 SECRETARY MARKS: Chairman 18 Choffo? 19 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: I vote aye. 20 SECRETARY MARKS: Mr. Chairman, 21 is there anything under old business? 22 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: No. Anything 23 that's new business? 24 SECRETARY MARKS: I have no new 25 business, Mr. Chairman? - 235 - 1 CHAIRMAN CHOFFO: That's a 2 first. Thank you, Steve. Well, I'd like to thank 3 everyone for donating their time tonight. Do I have 4 a motion to dismiss? 5 COMMISSIONER FITZGIBBONS: 6 Motion to dismiss. 7 COMMISSIONER BETTINGER: Motion 8 to adjourn. 9 SECRETARY MARKS: Thank you very 10 much. 11 (Meeting concluded at 11:37 p.m.) 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 - 236 - 1 C E R T I F I C A T I O N 2 3 I, Pnina Eilberg, hereby certify that the 4 foregoing is a true and correct transcription, to 5 the best of my ability, of the sound recorded 6 proceedings submitted for transcription. 7 8 I further certify that I am not employed by nor 9 related to any party to this action. 10 11 In witness whereof, I hereby sign this date: 12 June 28, 2007. 13 14 _________________________________ 15 Pnina Eilberg 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25