NEWARK – At least five businesses are among those the city’s COVID-19 Task Force had shut down over the Halloween weekend for violating some of Gov. Phil Murphy’s Coronavirus-curbing Executive Orders. The task force – made up of Newark Public Safety Fire Division, ABC and Code Enforcement officers – closed the following Oct. 31:
- King Soccer, 6 Elizabeth Ave.: Cited for operating without a Certificate of Occupancy and Closed.
- La Rouge Lounge, 972 Broad St.: Code Enforcement issued citations for operating above 25 percent capacity, not practicing social distancing and patrons failing to wear Personal Protective Equipment. Fire inspector issued citation for illegal hookah use.
- Lit21, 1034 McCarter Hwy.: Cited and closed for operating after 8 p.m. curfew, no PPE use, overcapacity and serving alcohol from the bar.
- ViVo Lounge, 167 Ferry St.: Cited and closed for having patrons eating inside after 8 p.m.
- Zepe’s Cafe Bar, 240 Elm St.: Cited and closed until Nov. 2 for “a crowd of patrons not socially distancing.” Place was issued a warning by ABC Oct. 30.
Mayor Ras Baraka and Public Safety Director Anthony Ambrose added, without elaborating, that the task force had confiscated 10,000 bottles of alcohol and arrested two alleged organizers of an Oct. 30 warehouse party. The raid sounds similar to ones NYPD had respectively made arrests on and closed in The Bronx and in Queens’ Williamsburg section.
IRVINGTON – Township police officers are looking for a resident who they said had stabbed two other acquaintances here early Oct. 30.
Responding IPD officers found a 29-year-old Newark man and a 22-year-old township woman with stab wounds at an address at 3:10 a.m. that Friday. The stabbing location has not been disclosed as of 3 p.m. Nov. 3.
The victims, before being sent to a local hospital for treatment, had identified their attacker as Moszena Ward, 25. They said that they and Ward were having a dispute. Ward remains at large as of press time.
EAST ORANGE – The influence of former Fourth Ward Councilwoman Florence M. Johnson, who died here Oct. 24, can be found among the tributes relatives and friends had left on her tribute page furnished by Woody’s Home for Services.
The tributes and recollections were not only from here and Newark Arts High School alumni but also from individuals from across the state who remember her as one of New Jersey Symphony Orchestra’s biggest boosters.
Johnson, 82, sought to bring various audiences to NJSO, whether they were performing in NJPAC or in Branch Brook Park. She was known for arranging bus service for seniors and lunches for them from local supermarkets while taking them to the latter’s annual summer concert venue.
Born Florence Reed in Newark Aug. 27, 1938, she may well have found her musical muse while attending Arts High. The Class of 1956 graduate was also a member of the school’s alumni association and kept her 50-year membership with Bethany Baptist Church.
Johnson, who worked as a property manager for 21 years in the greater Newark area, became involved with East Orange institutions once she moved here. The former East Orange Housing Authority Commissioner was also an officer of the East Orange Historical Society.
“Flo Jo,” as she was known in her later years, is survived by sisters Donna Burke, Joan Davenport, Patricia Jackson, Carol Rowland and Sandra Sanders, among other relatives.
Johnson, whose visitation and service was held Oct. 31 in Woody’s Orange funeral home, was privately interred Nov. 2. Memorial donations may be made to support.njsymphnyorchestra.org.
ORANGE – The city, barring unforeseen challenges, will be getting a Wawa convenience store and service station here at 164 Main St.
At least a majority of the Orange Planning Board approved the preliminary and site plan application made by 164 Main, LLC, here behind 347-349 Main St. Oct. 28. The OPB site, held under a tent for social distancing, was in 347-49 Main’s rear parking lot – where The Embassy Theater auditorium was before its October 2005 demolition.
The city planners’ speed – hearing and approval in one sitting – is another unique or unusual feature of the Wednesday night session.
The Belleville and Maplewood planning boards each held at least two sessions before respectively approving “11 Franklin LLC” and “1515 Springfield LLC” applications in 2018 and 2015.
Another distinction is what Orange Historic and Preservation Committee member Brabdon Matthews posted in his Facebook response. 164 Main, said Matthews, had bypassed the OHPC on its way to approval. The site is across South Main Street from Orange Commons Park and will be where the North Orange Baptist Church stood until around 1970.
The above said sister Wawas are the same size of what will replace the 1976-built Orange Commons Shopping Plaza on that 1.39-acre lot west of Hickory Street.
WEST ORANGE – The county’s Richard J. Codey Arena may have reopened to its COVID-related operating hours and rules, post “aggressive sanitizing” since Nov. 2, when you read this.
An entire NJ Devils Youth Hockey Team has meanwhile been quarantined away from the arena until at least Nov. 12 after one of its players had tested positive Monday for the Coronavirus.
A “county spokesman,” on Nov. 3, said that the youth and his team are one of several who practice and play games in the arena under the NHL NJ Devils banner. The Devils organization notified the arena of the positive test Monday, who then notified the county parks and recreation department.
“We’ve an aggressive schedule to sanitize the arena,” said the spokesman. “Our health officer noted that any contact tracing for the player would be conducted by municipal health officers in the municipality where the player resides.”
The arena had reopened during the pandemic for youth hockey games, private hockey and figure skating lessons, pre-registered skaters and small private groups or camps who rent the ice rink. The rink is otherwise not open for birthday parties or public skating.
What intensive sanitizing being done is in addition to rigorous cleaning and disinfecting of high touch areas, including skate lacing and removal, under federal CDCP protocols.
The team quarantine and arena sanitation does not affect the rest of what South Mountain Recreation Complex facilities that are open.
SOUTH ORANGE / MAPLEWOOD – The hybrid in-person reopening of South Orange-Maplewood School District classrooms, for the want of promised univent filters, has been postponed to Jan. 19.
SOMSD Superintendent Dr. Ronald G. Taylor, in his Oct. 26 open letter to the two-town public school community, said that he and the Board of Education is having the contractor responsible for outfitting the 11 school buildings for social distancing use complete the promised installation. Taylor and district officials had discovered that the filters, intended for classroom unit ventilators, were not installed while performing a late-October walkthrough inspection.
“During our Oct. 19 BOE meeting, we shared that our univents had been updated with filters with a Merv-16 rating,” said Taylor. “Unfortunately, our extensive inspection and investigation revealed that this was simply not true. Filters had not been installed as had been reported throughout all district classrooms; the vendor wasn’t contacted until after verification paperwork was submitted to the district.”
Taylor added that the district’s about 1,000 univents are being fitted with Merv-8 filters; the units cannot accept Merv-16 filters. That work, including repairing unit blowers and motors “as needed,” will take six to eight weeks to complete – once the filters arrive.
“Our vendor (said) that the filters are inexpensive and can be easily installed once they arrive,” continued the superintendent. “However, as you can imagine, the filters that we seek are in high demand.”
On the positive side, Taylor said that the univent work is in line with the SOMSD-wide HVAC improvement project. Other features of the social-distancing outfitting — including Plexiglass and hand sanitizer station installation, signage and carpet removal — have been completed.
The SOMSD buildings were targeted for a six-phase Nov. 12 reopening before the filter issue had surfaced.
MONTCLAIR – Montclair Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Jonathan Ponds and the Board of Education brought district parents mixed news Oct. 30 regarding their intended Nov. 9 and 23 reopening of buildings for hybrid in-person learning.
On one hand, the Oct. 28 positive test result of a Watchung School staff member has pushed reopening it and other MPS Pre-Kindergarten-Fifth Grade Schools to Nov. 16. Montclair High School and the middle schools are to now reopen Nov. 30.
MHS, on the other hand, will have a full-time principal when it does reopen. MBOE members were to decide from several final round candidates as early as their Nov. 3 meeting. (A virtual public forum of the finalists was held at 7 p.m. Nov. 2.)
Whoever the named person will be would relieve Eileen Gilbert as interim principal. Gilbert, who succeeded Terry Trigg-Scales as interim principal Oct. 30, will return to her regular assistant principal position.
Trigg-Scales, who was tabbed to fill in for the departing Anthony Grosso in September, issued her resignation letter that Friday. Details on why she stepped down was not made public here as of Nov. 3. Trigg-Scales continues as West Orange Board of Education Vice President.
The Watchung School is meanwhile being sanitized and disinfected by MPS workers and contractors – an effort in addition to the district-wide outfitting of all facilities for social distancing.
“Close contacts with the individual within the school have been notified and will quarantine,” said Ponds Oct. 28. “The district is coordinating closely with the Montclair Department of Health, following CDC, state and local health department guidance. Although disappointing, this (Oct. 30) decision reflects our best judgement regarding the health and safety of all concerned.”
BLOOMFIELD – Bloomfield Public Schools, said Superintendent Salvatore Goncalves here Oct. 26, will not reopen for in-person hybrid learning until January 2021.
Goncalves, at the virtual Bloomfield Board of Education meeting that Tuesday night, has pushed elementary and special education students’ Back to School Day to Jan. 25; teachers are to report inside for in-classroom virtual learning Jan. 19.
A date or dates for Bloomfield Middle and High schools’ reopening to their students, relative to Jan. 25, are to be announced.
“It has become apparent to me that members of our community and in particular our Teachers Association have taken with the assurances we’ve attempted to provide in terms of our environmental readiness to open up school in a hybrid/virtual model beginning in Nov. 30,” said Goncalves. “The extra time will provide the administration the opportunity to work with our contracted professionals to provide the (Bloomfield Education Association) leadership the opportunity to become more appreciative of the nearly $600,000 the district has spent on PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) for returning to live instruction during this continuance of this pandemic.”
The BTA is the largest contract bargaining group that BPS works with. Both the teachers’ union and school administrators are responsible for the health and safety of the around 6,600 Pre-Kindergarten-12th Grade students in the township system.
Goncalves and his administrators have aired several videos to the public in mid-October on how BPS intends to safely reopen the schools.
BELLEVILLE – Township officials, veterans groups and, hopefully, relatives of John A. Distasio will Honor his memory by renaming the corner of Garden and Dawson avenues here 10 a.m. Nov. 14.
The Old Fourth Ward street corner is closest to 145 Garden Ave., where the late airman, his parents, a brother and six sisters lived when the U.S. entered World War Two. John Arthur, who was born March 8, 1926, was attending Belleville High School and was working in Newark’s International Stirling Products when he enlisted with the U.S. Army Air Corps April 5, 1944.
Sgt. Distasio was assigned to the USAAC’s 372nd Bombardiment Squadron,30th Bomber Group- Heavy, and as a B-24 tail gunner in the war’s Pacific Theater.
Distasio was among a crew of seven that was conducting a raid on the Philippines’ Celebes Island when their plane had crash-landed there June 22, 1945. The would-have-been BHS Class of 1944 graduate’s body was never found.
Mother Maria Distasio, in 1960, had requested a headstone for her son at Arlington National Cemetery, Section ME, Site 24. J. Distasio’s name was also inscribed on Arlington and Manila American cemeteries’ Wall of the Missing.
NUTLEY – One of Nutley High School’s latest graduates has been charged with the Oct. 19 stabbing of a current NHS student here in the Avondale section.
Police Chief Thomas Strumolo and Public Safety Commissioner Alphonse Petracco, on Oct. 21, more than confirmed social media chatter about the Oct. 19 stabbing “of a juvenile” at Mt. Vernon Place and Woodcrest Lane 10 p.m.
Police, who found the victim “with a knife laceration and bleeding,” had him taken to a local hospital for treatment.
Strumolo and Petracco added that Antonio Lampon, 18, was arrested and had been charged with aggravated assault and weapons possession charges. Lampon had been tied to a “white Mazda SUV” that had fled the stabbing scene.
Lampon, according to contemporary sports articles, was a member of the NHS Raiders Boys Soccer Team last autumn. The senior had transferred from Newark’s St. Benedict’s Prep HS.
Authorities have not said to what degree Lampon and the victim knew each other.
