READINGTON TOWNSHIP COMMITTEE
READINGTON TOWNSHIP, HUNTERDON COUNTY, NEW JERSEY
HOLLAND BROOK SCHOOL
READINGTON TOWNSHIP, NEW JERSEY
FEBRUARY 21, 2006
6:30 P.M.
IN THE MATTER OF
READINGTON TOWNSHIP PUBLIC HEARING
COMMITTEE MEETING
......................
B E F O R E:
THE READINGTON TOWNSHIP COMMITTEE
_________________________________
MAYOR GERARD SHAMEY
JULIA ALLEN
THOMAS AURIEMMA
FRANK GATTI
BEATRICE MUIR
VITA MEKOVETZ, Township Clerk
A P P E A R A N C E S:
CONNELL FOLEY, LLP
85 Livingston Avenue
Roseland, New Jersey 07068
Attorneys for the Township Committee
BY: JAMES RHATICAN, ESQ.
SHARON DRAGAN, ESQ.
Attorney for the Township Committee
JACQUELINE KLAPP REPORTING SERVICES
Certified Shorthand Reporters
59 Old Croton Road
Flemington, New Jersey 08822
(908) 782-0874
2
1 MAYOR SHAMEY: Good evening, ladies
2 and gentlemen, I'm sorry for the delay. I
3 would like to welcome all of you to the
4 February 21, 2006, meeting of the Readington
5 Township Committee. I would like to begin by
6 announcing all laws governing the Open Public
7 Meetings Act have been met, and this meeting
8 has been duly advertised.
9 Let's salute the flag.
10 (Whereupon, Mayor Shamey led those
11 present in the salute to the flag.
12 MAYOR SHAMEY: This is a meeting of
13 the Readington Township Committee, we have
14 some things to take care of before we get to
15 the public hearings. We have just come out of
16 executive session, and we have a couple of
17 bits of business to take care of. The first
18 item on the executive agenda today was
19 personnel, we have a letter from our
20 Recreation Director requesting that the
21 Committee hire Lisa Hellings as the yoga
22 instructor at $30 an hour.
23 MS. ALLEN: I will make that motion.
24 MS. MUIR: I will second that.
25 (On roll call, all members voted in
3
1 the affirmative.)
2 MAYOR SHAMEY: The contract
3 negotiations for the three professional
4 services contracts that come under contract
5 negotiations. Is there a motion to approve
6 the professional services contract of our bond
7 counsel, McManimon & Scotland, LLC?
8 MS. MUIR: So moved.
9 MR. GATTI: Second.
10 (On roll call, all members voted in
11 the affirmative.)
12 MAYOR SHAMEY: Next, the professional
13 services contract for Martin Allen, Esq. as
14 our tax attorney. Is there a motion to
15 approve Mr. Allen's professional services
16 contract?
17 MS. ALLEN: So moved.
18 MR. GATTI: Second.
19 (On roll call, all members voted in
20 the affirmative.)
21 MAYOR SHAMEY: And lastly, is the
22 professional services contract for our public
23 defender, Patrick Clare, Esq. Is there a
24 motion to approve Mr. Clare's professional
25 services contract?
4
1 MS. ALLEN: So moved.
2 MR. AURIEMMA: Second.
3 (On roll call, all members voted in
4 the affirmative.)
5 MAYOR SHAMEY: Okay. Let me back up a
6 step. We have the consent agenda, all items
7 listed with an asterisk are considered to be
8 routine by the Township Committee and will be
9 covered by one motion. If there is anything
10 that a member or anyone else wishes to bring
11 to our attention, in that case, it will be
12 removed from the general order of business and
13 from its regular sequence on the agenda.
14 These are marked with an asterisk. Any
15 comments or statements from the Committee on
16 the consent agenda? This also, by the way, is
17 for approval of the minutes of January 17,
18 2006, and January 20, 2006.
19 Is there a motion on the consent
20 agenda and approval of minutes for those
21 meetings?
22 MR. AURIEMMA: Motion to approve the
23 consent agenda.
24 MAYOR SHAMEY: Is there a second?
25 MR. GATTI: Second.
5
1 (On roll call, all members voted in
2 the affirmative.)
3 MAYOR SHAMEY: Now, we will go quickly
4 before we get to the public hearing that we
5 are going to skip over correspondence, there
6 are three items of correspondence which are on
7 your agenda, copies of them are up front.
8 Does any member of the Committee have
9 any comment or question with regard to any of
10 the three items under consideration? Okay.
11 Moving on to old business, there is
12 none.
13 Do we want to take care of this piece
14 of new business or take care of it at the end
15 when we have the three public hearings?
16 MR. AURIEMMA: Let's do it at the end.
17 MAYOR SHAMEY: The right side says now
18 and the left side says later. I will break
19 the tie and suggest that we dispose of this
20 item now, because it is related to the Triple
21 D, which was covered in executive.
22 Do you want to speak to this, Julia?
23 MS. ALLEN: The first item of new
24 business is an ordinance authorizing the
25 conveyance of the farmland preservation or
6
1 agricultural development rights, easement to
2 the Hunterdon County Farmland Preservation
3 Program. Triple D, LLC, is the 38-acre farm
4 that we just spoke about, and I would make a
5 motion to pass the ordinance authorizing the
6 conveyance of the development rights to
7 Hunterdon County.
8 MAYOR SHAMEY: Is there a second?
9 MR. AURIEMMA: Second.
10 MAYOR SHAMEY: Roll call.
11 (On roll call, all members voted in
12 the affirmative.)
13 MAYOR SHAMEY: The second meeting in
14 March, is that okay?
15 MS. ALLEN: Yes.
16 MAYOR SHAMEY: Public hearing on that
17 will be March 20th. Okay.
18 We have four public hearings, and we
19 will get to the one that most, I assume, most
20 everybody is here for. This is the public
21 hearing on Ordinance No. 04-2006. Is there a
22 motion to close the regular meeting and open
23 the public hearing on this ordinance?
24 MR. AURIEMMA: Moved.
25 MR. GATTI: Second.
7
1 MAYOR SHAMEY: All in favor, say aye.
2 (On roll call, all members voted in
3 the affirmative.)
4 MAYOR SHAMEY: By way of introduction,
5 ladies and gentlemen, this is the public
6 hearing on Ordinance No. 04-2006, which is an
7 ordinance that is entitled "Bond Ordinance
8 Providing for Acquisition of Airport and Land
9 or Interest in Land for Preservation, Block
10 48, Lot 23; Block 55, Lot 33; Block 56, Lots
11 1, 3, 6 and 8; Block 39, Lot 24; and Block 67,
12 Lot 2, owner: Solberg Aviation/Hromoho), in
13 and by the Township of Readington, in the
14 County of Hunterdon, New Jersey, Appropriating
15 $22 Million therefor, and Authorizing the
16 Issuance of $21,700,000 Bonds or Notes of the
17 Township to Finance Part of the Cost Thereof."
18 This ordinance was introduced at this
19 Committee's meeting of February 6, 2006, at
20 which time the Township Committee also adopted
21 a resolution which authorized the law firm of
22 Connell, Foley, LLC, to undertake certain
23 investigations of the subject property, that
24 is the property that has just been enumerated,
25 Solberg Airport and Hromoho Properties.
8
1 The purpose of the investigation is to
2 conduct preliminary assessments including
3 investigations and surveys and, more
4 importantly, to obtain appraisals.
5 Both the bond ordiannce, as well as
6 the resolution I just referred to, are
7 necessary if we are to continue to have
8 negotiations with Solberg Aviation about the
9 future of the airport and about the open space
10 surrounding it, which are to be meaningful.
11 The appraisals are, of course, necessary to be
12 sure the Township has current and accurate
13 information with which to offer a fair amount
14 of compensation in our discussions with the
15 Solbergs and the bond ordinance places the
16 Committee in a position to make a contingency
17 pre-cash offer to Solberg Aviation for the
18 open space that the Township is interested in
19 preserving and for certain development
20 restrictions on the airport property.
21 It should be noted clearly that
22 municipal acquisition of the airport is not
23 contemplated at this time. This is not an
24 eminent domain ordinance. This is a bond
25 ordinance. It is the preference of this
9
1 Committee that ownership of the airport remain
2 in the owners, that is Solberg Aviation. So I
3 cannot stress enough to you the fact that this
4 a public hearing on a bond ordinance. Just
5 give me one moment.
6 The bond ordinance can be analogized
7 to taking out a home equity line of credit on
8 your house. What it does is it puts the
9 Township in a position to draw down on that
10 allotment of money. If the Committee is to
11 adopt this ordinance and pass this ordinance
12 this evening, we will not have spent a dime of
13 that $22 million, it is a bond ordinance only.
14 Again, it puts us in a position to have money
15 on the table to show the Solbergs and Solberg
16 Aviation that we are serious in our effort to
17 negotiate a resolution to our issues.
18 So what we are going to do this
19 evening is as follows: I am going to present
20 some background information to the audience,
21 just to get people caught up to date. For
22 those of you who were not present at the
23 January 17th informational meeting, it will
24 help bring you up to date as to recent events.
25 Mrs. Allen will present certain
10
1 information relevant to the various funding
2 opportunities that are available to the
3 Township, and funding sources. We will then
4 have Mr. Gatti, who is our finance liaison,
5 speak to anticipated tax impact, keeping in
6 mind that these are hypothetical scenarios
7 that we will be working with. They are not
8 numbers to which we can or wish to be bound.
9 They are examples based upon the hypothetical
10 home assessed at $400,000, and they are also
11 numbers that have been arrived at just by
12 virtue of our experience and our Farmland and
13 Open Space Act programs. So again, there are
14 numbers that we can work with, and they are
15 good examples to use. Again, perhaps not
16 exact.
17 Following Mr. Gatti's presentation on
18 tax impact, and he will also speak to the
19 municipal debt, and all this will move along
20 as quickly as possible, because we have been
21 through much of this before.
22 There have been numerous questions
23 raised, both by residents and in the press,
24 with regards to the various powers and
25 authorities of the various levels of
11
1 government that are involved in any situation
2 such as this, and that is us, the local
3 government, the State Government and the
4 Federal Government.
5 Numerous questions have been asked.
6 Relevant, pointed questions that I am going to
7 attempt to address and answer to the best of
8 my abilities.
9 We will then have a public comment
10 portion following those presentations, and I
11 will speak more to that procedure that we will
12 be following for that when we start the public
13 comment portion. So with that said, just a
14 couple of other things: We intend to
15 summarize our goals. We will again talk about
16 debt with the funding operations and funding
17 sources and tax impacts. I note that Mr.
18 Solberg was in the hallway, but I do not know
19 if I see him in this room. If any
20 representative of Solberg Aviation wishes to
21 present any information, they will be given
22 the opportunity to do so this evening. They
23 are invited to do so, as they have always been
24 invited to do so. Then again, we will open it
25 up to the public for comments.
12
1 Now, if you will give us a moment, we
2 are just going to shift the microphones to
3 that table and ask Jay Rhatican to vacate, if
4 he would.
5 Thank you for your patience. We are
6 trying to figure out the best way to do this
7 logistically, and this seems to make sense,
8 because we will be referring to certain
9 slides, and we have other material that we can
10 work off of. So I will wait for somebody to
11 tell me that that things is up and we can
12 begin.
13 Mr. Gatti, as soon as you give me the
14 green light, we will get started.
15 We will begin with slide one. I am
16 going to move through this as quickly as
17 possible, ladies and gentlemen, because I know
18 there are a lot of you that want to comment.
19 But there is a lot of additional material that
20 I think needs to be addressed to the public,
21 and before we start, is there any way that we
22 can leave some type of light on back here so
23 maybe I can read?
24 Just to review. The Township has had
25 longstanding goals of preservation of Solberg
13
1 Airport. Going back to the Township Master
2 Plan in the mid 1990s, and earlier than that,
3 this site has been identified by both the
4 local government, by Hunterdon County and by
5 the State of New Jersey as a high priority
6 preservation area. It is always and continues
7 to be a goal of the Township to maintain the
8 airport and see the airport maintained in its
9 current configuration, and when we talk about
10 configuration, we necessarily talk about
11 runway length. Finally, consistent with
12 longstanding policies of the Township, it has
13 always been the goal of this Township for
14 years, if not decades, for preservation of
15 this tract and preservation of the 650 acres
16 of open space surrounding the airport.
17 Now, back in August of 2005, the bond
18 ordinance which was similar, if not the same
19 as the ordinance that is here for considera-
20 tion this evening, was introduced and then
21 withdrawn by this Committee at its August 22,
22 2005, meeting. This taking place following an
23 agreement being reached with Solberg Aviation
24 to conduct good faith negotiations in an
25 attempt to resolve this longstanding issue
14
1 that has been here in our township. Six
2 negotiation sessions took place over a five-
3 month period. Those were attended by
4 Committeewoman Allen, then Mayor Gatti, our
5 counsel, Jay Rhatigan, the three Solbergs and
6 their lawyer from Morristown, he is an
7 attorney, Lawrence Berger. I believe that is
8 it.
9 On January 2, 2006, at the final
10 negotiation session, the negotiations were
11 effectively terminated. It was reported back
12 to this Committee by Mr. Gatti and by Mrs.
13 Allen that the Township's insistence on
14 maintenance of this runway length that is
15 currently 3,735 feet, was of paramount
16 importance to this Township, and this Township
17 was not interested in seeing the runway
18 lengthened at all beyond that length. They
19 were told at that point that, essentially, we
20 were wasting our time. This is through their
21 counsel.
22 The parties got up, they shook hands
23 and walked out.
24 We then conducted a public information
25 hearing or meeting, rather, in this room on
15
1 January 17th, and it was at that point that
2 rather detailed information was presented to
3 the public with respect to the negotiations,
4 with respect to some general aviation
5 materials and information. Environmental
6 experts spoke, we had a noise expert as well,
7 and much, if not all, of this information is
8 posted on the Township website and I would
9 urge our residents to please take the time, if
10 you can, and review this information. It may
11 generate questions, comments, criticisms and
12 what have you. But it has all been posted.
13 Again, on February 6th, the Township
14 Committee authorized an appraisal to be done
15 with respect to the property.
16 Slide three. Where are negotiations
17 today? As reported at the January 17th
18 meeting, the Township's position is as
19 follows: The Township is offering Solberg
20 Aviation $22 million, and the Solbergs would
21 retain the airport as it exists today. It
22 would be preserved. The existing runways
23 would not be lengthened; however, there is
24 only 3,000 feet paved right now, and there is
25 a remaining 735 feet that could be paved.
16
1 That is something that there would be no
2 objection to. So it keeps the existing
3 runways not to be lengthened, that is, from
4 their licensed length. The hangar space, in a
5 nut shell and, as reported at the January 17th
6 meeting, Solberg Aviation's initial demand was
7 for a 5,600-foot runway, the same being told
8 to us as being non-starter or anything less
9 than that, and then one million square feet of
10 office and hangar space is being requested.
11 In the course of the negotiations, the runway
12 length demand was slid back a bit by Solberg
13 Aviation to 5,000 feet, and the requested
14 hangar and office space was reduced to 500,000
15 square feet.
16 Just by point of comparison,
17 Morristown Airport, if any of you are familiar
18 with it, has about 500,000 square feet of
19 Hangar and office space.
20 The Township would acquire and
21 preserve the 600 acres of open space. The
22 open space around the airport would be
23 permanently preserved, and the cost of up to
24 $22 million would be reimbursed through State
25 open space grants. Mrs. Allen will speak
17
1 specifically as to the funding issues, so I
2 will not delve into those areas at all right
3 now. There has been some confusion, and a
4 little bit of misinformation, as to what is
5 and what is not available, and we will speak
6 to that.
7 Both the airport and the site's
8 considerable natural resources would be
9 protected under this scenario.
10 Currently, as most recently expressed
11 in the private negotiation sessions that I
12 referred to, the Solbergs' position is the
13 following: That the airport be allowed to
14 expand, in the sense the runway would be paved
15 out to a 5,000 foot paved primary runway.
16 That is slightly longer than the requested
17 runway that was contained in the airport
18 Master Plan and the Airport Layout Plan of
19 1991, which called for a 4,900 foot runway.
20 For some reason, it has grown to 5,000 from
21 that. They would also like to pave out to
22 3,700 feet the cross-winds runway.
23 Now, there is a diagram here that has
24 been handed out before, and it gives the lay
25 of the land and configuration of the runways
18
1 with regard to the roads that are nearby, with
2 regards to the location of the school and the
3 middle school. So it is helpful to get your
4 hands on that so they can be put into
5 perspective. They are requesting 500,000