That’s New Jersey’s deadline for our Planning Board to revise the all-important Master Plan that will guide Borough decision-making and development for the next ten years.
To get that job done, the Planning Board will need to get residents to attend meetings and share ideas, which few residents do.
How can the Planning Board attract Chathamites to the meetings, and get them engaged in the process?
How about muzzling residents? Seriously.
The Planning Board already chooses not to Zoom most of its meetings, and does NOT allow residents to participate by Zoom.
At the December 3rd meeting, which was not Zoomed, Planning Board lawyer Vincent Loughlin advocated taking it one step further: changing the Board’s bylaws to do away with the traditional Public Comment period we have come to expect at every Borough meeting, severely restricting normal, public participation in-person.(See the meeting video below, starting at approximately 11:34.)
”There’s so much misunderstanding about how municipal government functions,” says Laughlin. His solution? Totally shut out all public participation except on the matter before the Planning Board at that moment, typically limited to cross examination and sworn testimony on a specific application.
Lawyers don’t make policy like that. Who told Mr. Laughlin to push abolishing Public Comment at Planning Board meetings?
”[Borough Administrator and Planning Board member]Steve Williams suggested that perhaps we could remove that [Public Comment period] from the agenda,” said the Borough Clerk. “So that would remove the public portion where the public can speak from the agenda so they would only speak if we had an application.”(See meeting video below.)
Kudos to those alert Planning Board members who had the good sense to resist that flagrant power grab. We can only hope they will stay strong.
You can see it all in the video below, where the meeting begins about 7:29 and the discussion of abolishing Public Comments begins about 11:34.
Despite growing public opposition, the Mayor & Council still aim to sacrifice the wooded, Borough-owned lot at 58 North Passaic Avenue – right next to Memorial Park – without having considered the alternatives!
Will you stand for that?
”It’s as green as Kermit the Frog.”
Tell the Mayor & Council:
You’re with the 90% of Chathamites who want to preserve that green lot for the benefit and enjoyment of current and future generations.
It is irresponsible to sacrifice that precious parcel without having carefully considered each of the potential alternative sites.
Residents deserve a chance to weigh in on the alternatives before they make decisions like this one, that will permanently change Chatham Borough
Use the north entrance. Take the elevator to the upper level.
Arrive when convenient. Stay only as long as you please.
Speaking is optional.
What the heck is the above all about?
Last spring, residents flatly rejected a Master Plan amendment, hastily developed behind closed doors, which included needlessly sacrificing the green parcel at 58 North Passaic to help satisfy the Borough’s new affordable housing quota.
Residents urged the Council to consider alternatives that could satisfy that quota, while also preserving that green land for current and future generations.
On June 18th, the Planning Board rubber stamped the take-it-or-leave-it plan. Though the Borough’s experts noted that the Council could later nominate alternative sites, some Council members insisted that the plan was a done deal.
But then two informal Facebook polls revealed that more than 90% of Chathamites want that wooded, Borough-owned parcel preserved for the benefit of current and future generations.
Screenshot
And now a growing chorus of residents is stepping forward to implore the Council to come up with alternatives that could preserve that precious public land. Several attended the September 8th Council meeting.
The looming threat to 58 North Passaic Avenue has become an issue in the current race for Borough Council.
Incumbent Council Member Karen Koronkiewicz (who co-designed the plan) suggested that the Borough might be able to build four apartments on the small lot at 58 North Passaic without chopping down most or all of the trees there.
”If you’re going to build four apartments,” scoffed challenger Joe Barrette, “you have to cut the trees down.”
He’s right about that, as the below aerial views of 58 North Passaic demonstrate. The first shows the site, almost covered what trees, and the second, which shows what the Council aims to build there, states that it will preserve ONE such tree.
Screenshot
At the September 10th debate, first time candidate Miles Gilmore, a member of the Shade Tree Commission, professed little understanding of the housing issue. He proved it by speaking eloquently in favor of protecting the trees at 58 North Passaic, while advocating acquiescence to the Council’s current plan, which will make it necessary to chop down virtually all of them.
Let’s hope Mr. Gilmore will look into the housing plan, and realize that the only way to preserve those trees is to preserve 58 North Passaic and put the new apartments elsewhere in the Borough.
Is it too late to preserve the wooded, Borough-owned lot at 58 North Passaic Avenue, right next to home plate at Memorial Park?No!
In case you haven’t heard, that lovely, green parcel is targeted for development under a controversial Master Plan amendment that also allows construction of up to 206 new apartments on the busy east end of Main Street.
In June, Hundreds of residents protested that plan, but to no avail.
If the Mayor & Council choose instead to sacrifice 58 North Passaic without having considered all the alternatives, they will lose the chance to achieve a better outcome for Chatham Borough.
To avoid that fate, the Mayor & Council must begin searching for better options immediately after Labor Day.
What are they doing about that?
What substantive steps have our Mayor & Council been taking to prepare to identify better alternatives to developing 58 North Passaic Avenue?
Stop by the Council meeting, Monday, 8 September 2025, 7:30 pm, Borough Hall, 54 Fairmount Ave. (Use the north entrance. Take the elevator to the upper level. Speaking is optional.)
Who is responsible for the Master Plan amendment our Planning Board won’t see until June 6, but is under pressure to adopt on June18, setting Borough housing policy for the next ten years?
Why did our Borough Council let someone concoct such a plan 100% behind closed doors, without any public input?
Why does that plan include developing a vacant, green, woodsy, Borough-owned lot right next to Memorial Park?
58 N. Passaic Avenue
Was it ok for our Borough Council to skip presenting that plan in public, skip voting on it, skip running it by the Shade Tree Commission or Environmental Commission, and instead simply pay a hired planner to present a summary to our Planning Board?
Did the Council have an obligation to explain, release, or disclose the actual plan BEFORE turning it over to the Planning Board?
Did having the planner tell the Planning Board about the plan really muzzle the Borough Council as claimed?
Is the Planning Board required to approve the plan, which it won’t even see until at least June 6?
If the Planning Board is required to rubber stamp the never-before-seen plan, which the Council has never voted on or even discussed in public, then who is responsible for the policy decisions that will guide local decision making for the next ten years?
Why does the Council President say answering questions like that would expose her to “legal risk”?
Ask her: Jmathiasen@chathamborough.org
Ok with you if the Planning Board votes to develop that green, vacant, Borough-owned lot right next to the park without having justified or explained that choice?
“It was not a sham vote,” insisted the Mayor, saying she wasn’t aware of the discrepancy until two weeks later, when Bob Weber showed proof at the 7/8 Council meeting.
Now the Mayor needs to find out who made that call behind her back and let us residents know.
UPDATE: Does the employee’s explanation make any sense at all?
From Newark and Hackensack to Cherry Hill and Cape May, we all cherish our freedom.
That’s why residents of all stripes are asking Governor Murphy to veto a bill that would undermine our freedom by gutting our right to public records.
Please join us. Contact Governor Murphy. Call (609) 292 6000. Text (732) 605 5455. Or go to www.nj.gov/governor/to send an email.
Urge the Governor to veto bill S-2930/A-4045, which would gut the Open Records law.
Btw, this is NOT a partisan issue. The opposition spans the political spectrum, from:
NJ Working Families Party, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, and Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop); to
the founder of the Fair Share Housing Center, the NJ Public Defender’s Office, League of Women Voters, and the NJ Press Association); to
NJ State Assemblyman Brian Bergen (R-Dist. 26, Denville area); “a conservative bomb-thrower” per The New Jersey Globe.)
What has drawn together all these strange bedfellows?
“…I fear that if documents are harder to get [via the OPRA process], we will get less transparency and that will lead to more corruption, fraud, waste, and abuse. If your [Assembly / Senate] goal was to save money, be careful. A less transparent government is very likely a more expensive one, I fear….”
Kevin Walsh, founder of Fair Share Housing Project and now Acting State Comptroller of the State of New Jersey [State watchdog] during NJ State Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee Hearing on Mon 3/11/2024
“…this bill [S-2930] is dangerous…giving you [lawmakers] the benefit of the doubt, some of you are just terribly misinformed or intentionally misled…”; ” …and frankly this bill really does look like a list of all the cases that they [defendant municipalities] lost …”
C.J. Griffin, Esq. during NJ State Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee Hearing on Mon 3/11/2024.
“…The Synopsis of the Bill [S-2930] innocuously provides that the Bill “makes various changes to process for access to government records; appropriates $8 million.” In reality, the Bill eviscerates New Jersey’s Open Public Records Act, N.J.S.A. 47:1A-1 et seq. (“OPRA”) – a statute that was carefully and painstakingly crafted over a period of fourteen years…
New Jersey Press Association statement dated 3/7/2024
