Close to $1M in Road Projects Approved by Borough Council

Monday’s Borough Council Meeting at addressed a number of topics, as well as passing ordinances to appropriate $450,000 for the reconstruction of Green Avenue and $539,000 for the reconstruction of Pine, Cedar, Rose and Beech avenues.

While the reconstruction of Pine, Cedar, Rose and Beech avenues passed unanimously, Green Avenue passed by a 3-2 margin, with council members Robert Conley and Sam Cerciello voting against the measure.

Conley, a Democrat who is running for mayor, said that there are other projects in Madison that he believes need more focus, citing a number roads that force residents to deal with basement flooding due to a lack effective storm drains, rather than fixing potholes on Green Avenue, which is available for state funding.

Council member Jeannie Tsukamoto disagreed, saying, “I believe this road [Green Avenue] desperately needs to be fixed. We’ve been talking about it since 2008. It’s time to build and again, there’s no guaranteed funding [in the future].”

State funding is not available for work on Pine, Cedar, Rose and Beech.

The Council also unanimously passed an ordinance to appropriate $220,000 from the General Capital Improvement Fund for reimbursement to the for replacement construction of the parking lot.

Council member Don Links opened a discussion regarding how the borough manages its natural grass playing fields. He suggested that local recreational sports leagues should take over control of maintenance, lessening the burden on Madison’s employees, while at the same time cutting costs for taxpayers. He suggested community baseball organizations as a suitable test of such a plan.

Links, who brought the topic to discussion after seeing this approach implemented in other towns, cited an increase in efficiency of field preperation between games, as well as the reduction of cost for residents, as the main reasons for making the change.

In other athletic field news, the Council passed resolutions to contract Madison’s Dennis Harrington for field inspections and oversight of the Madison Recreation Complex synthetic turf fields project, and Omland Engineers for inspections and oversight of the Woodland Road project. Both resolutions passed by votes of 4-1, with Cerciello dissenting.

The Council also put a hold on a resolution to renew liquor licenses in the borough for 2011-12 until the next scheduled meeting, as members wait for police to finish investigating the sale of alcohol to minors in town.

In other news, the Madison youth softball league presented a check to the Madison Athletic Foundation in the amount of $6,760, from user fees that will help pay down contsruction costs for the turf fields.