Second Ward Councilwoman’s latest newsletter details tonight’s Hoboken Council meeting agenda:
Dear friends and neighbors,
A quick note covering:
- 4/20 City Council Meeting and 2022 Budget Introduction
- Cannabis update
- Ukraine
APRIL 20TH
City Council Meeting – Mayor Bhalla is presenting his proposed 2022 Budget with a 5.6% tax levy increase. At the meeting, the City Council will vote to introduce the budget and officially start the review and adoption process.
The headline for the 5.6% tax increase is the $7M / 14% in permanent salary increases. The major offsetting contributor is a $3M reduction in the city’s annual guestimate for health care costs. Most of the salary increases have gone to existing employees (including the City Council), with a few ‘strategic’ hires including a former Councilwoman, a former police chief, our existing County elected representative, and Mayor Bhalla’s former campaign manager (who is simultaneously serving as a taxpayer funded aid to the mayor while also currently serving as the treasurer for the 2025 campaigns for Mayor Bhalla and Councilmembers Jabbour and Quintero). These four alone total ~$400K. Remember that every ~$300K in spending is a .5% tax increase.
A few other Items on the agenda:
- Awarding Contract for Boat Removal in Weehawken Cove. This is the first step to removing the sunken boats in Weehawken Cove using funds from a NOAA grant. This activity should happen early summer (after the migration season).
- Leasing the City Owned Jubilee Center to Hoboken Public Schools for PreK 3 & PreK 4 for $183,000/year. The largest enrollment growth in the district schools are the young years as the enrollment wave goes through the district. My understanding is only Early Childhood Learning can be housed in non BOE owned properties so this type of lease allows for more capacity in the elementary schools. The lease states that the population served by the leased premises must be 51% low or moderate income which I want to understand how this compares with the demographics of this age group.
- Designating Police Headquarters at 100 Hudson as a Redevelopment Area. This was tough to find because the title of the resolution doesn’t tell you anything – whenever the administration buries the actual title and purpose of a piece of legislation, it is because they probably do not want the public to see what they are doing. Nor the City Council. Why is this designation an issue? And why is it necessary? In reverse order, it isn’t necessary. In Hoboken, there is only one reason to designate a city owned property as a redevelopment area and that is so that the city does not have to conduct a public process to get the highest and best price for taxpayer owned properties if it wants to sell the property. Instead, the Bhalla administration with its five City Council votes can merely strike a deal with whatever developer it wants on whatever price it can justify using taxpayer dollars.
- Cannabis Law Amendment to facilitate the expansion of the two approved medical dispensaries – Harmony and Terrapin – into recreational dispensaries. Surprised? You shouldn’t be – this was always their play and why they spent so much on the best located properties in Hoboken. What this ordinance does is allow their expansion into recreational without having to comply with the location restrictions requirements in our laws – they are directly across from each other near the PATH. These are ginormous versions of “High Access” points for recreational cannabis tourism (even more than the Hudson Tavern location). What is less obvious is who is behind the amendment. For clarity – it is NOT the Councilmember listed as the sponsor. It is CP Russo and / or the Bhalla administration. Surprised? You shouldn’t be.
CANNABIS
Last week, the Hoboken Planning Board deemed complete the application for the Hudson Tavern dispensary. The next steps are the Hoboken Planning Board hearing, expected to be in June and the Hudson County Planning Board hearing, expected to be in May / June. The jurisdiction of the latter covers ONLY Traffic and Sewer. The main question for the Hoboken Planning Board will be whether the dispensary meets the purpose of the Z-3 zone in our code which is neighborhood commercial – 2,500 sf and smaller businesses that support the surrounding neighborhood and do not detract from the neighborhood. The neighbors will have to join that night to help the Hoboken Planning Board decide… More to come.
UKRAINE
Who knew that the situation in Ukraine could get any more dire. Jersey City now has 21 Ukrainian families (that they are aware of) who were welcomed this week. If you want to help these families, and many others expected, you can sign up with Ukrainian Jersey City’ Displaced Hudson County Ukrainians Sponsor Form / Форма Спонсорів Біженців із України (google.com).
Also, as a reminder of the other ways you can help as well: Rent for Refugees, a fundraising campaign organized by The City of Hoboken – Welcome Home Jersey City (welcomehomerefugees.org). Razom, International Rescue Committee (IRC), Friends of Chervonohrad and a new one: St. Jude’s Efforts for Ukrainian Children with Cancer
Clarification – Each time I read CP Russo’s printed comments when interviewed about our Commonsense Cannabis Law Changes that the “Council has every right to change its mind…” I get more angry. Lets be very clear – the City Council didn’t change their mind. CP Russo misled the City Council with what was in his ordinance last August when we voted 9-0 to approve “opt in” language. Not once did he mention he was removing the cap on number of dispensaries (then 5) and significantly expanding the areas where recreational cannabis could be sold in Hoboken including in densely populated residential areas and near schools and parks. We didn’t “change our minds”. We believed him and as a result, didn’t do enough of our job by reading the ordinance in detail. Now the City Council and the Bhalla administration have to pick up the pieces and put them back together to protect the quality of life of Hoboken residents.
Please forward to everyone you know who may be interested in this newsletter. Feel free to email me at councilwomanfisher2@gmail.com or call me at 201-208-1674 to discuss what you have read or anything else that is important to you.
TiffanieFisher
Hoboken City Council, 2nd Ward
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