Ringwood Council Meeting Blog June 16th, 2026

Hi Ringwood! If you would like to watch a video of the entire council meeting you can here:

Proclamations and Presentations:

• Our new officer, Anthony Pachella was sworn in who is a lifelong Ringwood resident.

Manager’s Report:

Grants:

• Application for the Assistance to Firefighters Grant is being prepared to support radio upgrades for Fire and EMS services. The total request is $678,068.

• The Borough received $30,033.57 from the Sustaining Local Health Infrastructure Grant.

• We have been recommended for a $250,000 award through the Passaic County Open Space Grant for the Stonetown turf field project. The award is pending a public hearing.

DPW:

• Since the last Council meeting, the DPW has responded to six emergency incidents outside of normal business hours related to storm damage.

ORPA:

• The requestor for the OPRA request receives free legal representation through the GRC, but the Borough must hire counsel to defend the case. Due to this barrage of requests for information, the legal costs to the taxpayers will be significant.

Orange and Rockland Electric:

• Borough officials walked the entire ORU project on Kendall Drive, Carletondale Road, and Sloatsburg Road.  During the inspection, they identified and marked approximately 40 locations requiring corrective work, including grading, rock removal, vegetation restoration, and general site cleanup. We are also requiring them to fix the road conditions.  

Recycling Dept.

• Caring for Ringwood Day has been rescheduled for June 27th at 8:30am for refreshments with a 9am start time.

Annual Audit:

• Tax collections remain at 99.13%

• Recommendations: 

  • Purchase orders are prepared and approved prior to the order of goods and services. 

    • The exception of emergency vehicles repairs and items that require immediate attention.

  • Segregation of duties (This is a recommendation for about 90% of the municipalities that we work with.  Auditors apply this standard to Fortune 500 companies which is very different from a small municipality.) Mitigating controls are in place.

New Business:

Ordinance 2026 #7: Courtesy Bussing to Lakeland Regional High School

• An evaluation of the courtesy busing program around the Skyline Drive area of town for the 2025-2026 school year was completed, showing a total cost of $138,881.16 through May 2026.

• Lakeland monitored the use of the courtesy bussing. Ridership averaged approximately 5 students in the morning and 25 students in the afternoon, for a total of about 30 students per day.  We would like to change from two to one bus in order to be fiscally responsible.

• A proposed subscription fee of $300 per child per year would apply to participating families. Some other towns in the area charge up to $1,300. 

Resolutions:

• Five active liquor licenses were up for renewal.

• Two inactive liquor licenses were up for renewal.

  • Members from those businesses were present and discussed their business plan and how far they are in the process. 

  • One inactive license is a liquor license for a restaurant and the other is for a liquor store.

End of Meeting Comments:

• Congrats to Officer Van Dunk on your award from Mothers Against Drunk Driving.  Thank you for taking those under the influence off of our roads.

• Thank you to everyone that made volunteer day possible.  It was a great event that was well attended. I personally thought the jaws of live extraction demonstration was very educational.  I was so impressed to see everyone working together during this drill. Thank you to all of our first responders.

• We’d like to congratulate the Ringwood Raptors 13U baseball team! The boys won their championship in the USABL after an undefeated 11-0 season!

• Our Ringwood Public Library in collaboration with our public schools are having a summer reading kick off on Saturday, June 27th from 11-2pm. Their theme this year is “Unearth a Story.”

• We recently had a ribbon cutting on the new Fairy Trail located next to the Ringwood Public Library playground.  Thank you to Tom Conway, troop leaders Breeze & Sheri and the girl scouts for making this whimsical trail possible.  You’ve got to check it out!

• We’d also like to congratulate Logan on his Eagle Scout ceremony this past Sunday. Councilman Noonan, Assemblyman Bergen and Deputy Mayor Kerr were in attendance. Ringwood is so proud of you!

• We’d like to congratulate all of our recent graduates from preschool up through college. Never stop learning and have a safe summer!

• Ringwood’s Music in the Woods Summer Concert Series Schedule is out! Check it out here: https://www.ringwoodnj.net/qcontent/NewsFeed.aspx?FeedID=1739

Warm Regards,