NEWARK / NUTLEY – Mourning over the April 3 death of Rev. Kyle “The Voice” Abercrombie has spread well beyond his native city and one of the township’s faith communities.
Abercrombie, 57, whose last address was in the Weequahic section and who was a longtime associate pastor of the First Baptist Church of Nutley, had been battling lung cancer the past year.
Abercrombie’s distinct voice and phraseology were heard from ‘Local Talk” area pulpits, fashion runways and various public events. for five decades. “The 1 Voice 4 All” may be best known for saying, “Take a Look, Take a Good Look – and Look No Further,” which became the basis of a 2015 Acebeat single release.
Kyle Abercrombie was born in Newark to Rev. Dr. James and Christine Abercrombie Dec. 8, 1963 but the family moved in 1968 to become one of the few African American families in Hillside. Kyle, Hillside Class of 1981, attended Pastor Abercrombie’s FBCN Sunday school and sang in its Little Angels and Young Adults choirs while attending New York’s Berkeley School of Fashion and taking accounting and marketing classes at Essex County College.
The rising Macy’s employee activity commentator director had an epiphany while he had walked to an ambulance after crawling out of an overturned car. He studied to become a certified and ordained minister in 1995 and soon became FBCN’s associate pastor. He was also Men’s Ministry President at Newark’s First Timothy Baptist Church.
Odyssey International’s director and fashion coordinator for FP Youth Outcry founded KA& Company “Traveling Fashion Show” in 1980. He was the lead stylist for Unique Design Men’s Wear in downtown Newark when he died.
The twice Black Fashion and Entertainment “Commentator of the Year” awardee was buried in Evergreen Cemetery after an April 10 funeral at Irvington’s Transcend Worship Center. Mother Christine, companion Antoinette King, brothers Rev. Lance Abercrombie and Darryl Walker, sister Vanessa Abercrombie and godchildren Brittney Peterson, Abdur Shakirullah and Taylor Mceachin are among his survivors.
“Reach for the stars. If you land upon the Moon, just remember, you’re still on high ground.”
IRVINGTON – Township police officers have been looking out for a Honda CRV – and the occupants who shot a man here by the Newark border – since March 20.
IPD officers who responded to gunfire reports at 7 p.m. that Saturday converged on 18th Avenue and South 20th Street. There they found “a male victim suffering bullet wounds in his leg.”
Officers believe that “two male suspects exited a blue Honda CRV” in that East Ward intersection, fired in the victim’s direction, reboarded the CRV and sped away.
The victim was taken to Newark’s University Hospital for treatment of non-life-threatening injuries.
EAST ORANGE – This city’s planning board intends to continue its public hearing over a proposal to build a five-story, 40-unit apartment building here on 12 North Oraton Parkway on May 5.
KSH N. Oraton Development LLC, of Middletown, N.Y., began presenting its plan to build 28 one-bedroom and 12 two-bedroom units on the vacant lot at the board’s April 7 hearing. Bicycle parking, a gym and “rooftop amenity space” are among its features.
The four apartment floors are to be built above 40 parking spaces – with a twist. Residents and visitors will be using automatic, “stackable” parking lifts more commonly found on small downtown Newark parking lots.
KSH had bought the .31 acre lot from Flamingo Builders, LLC, of South Orange, for $440,000 in 2019. The 1970’s era Exxon station was removed from there at least 13 years ago.
Parking garage traffic to 12 No. Oration’s location is to come from East Freeway Drive and Maple Street – which may alleviate a traffic challenge.
The lot is bordered by northbound Oraton Parkway and an entrance ramp for the Garden State Parkway and Interstate 280. That ramp had been the source of City Council requests to NJDOT and GSP parent N.J. Turnpike Authority to fill or remove potholes there.
The GSP and 280’s respective 1950s and 60s construction, including their Exit 145/12B interchange, had made that lot part of a three-block Maple Avenue traffic island. That neighborhood’s homeowners, apartment dwellers, Salem Advent Church / “The Church at The Crossroads” and four businesses have survived despite a 280-prompted realignment of Main Street/King Boulevard that severed its connection to Maple Avenue.
ORANGE – The city’s chief executive officer, by praising the latest water quality findings of one environmental regulation agency, may have thrown shade at another agency.
Mayor Dwayne D. Warren, in a March 17 press release, praised the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s test results on per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances – better known as the PFAS, PFOA and PFOS family. These chemicals, whose trade names include Scotchguard and Teflon, were used for waterproofing and non-sticking until they were found to be carcinogenic.
The EPA found that Orange’s water, drawn from wells in Millburn’s part of South Mountain Reservation and East Hanover, “are well below the EPA’s 70 parts per trillion (gallons) health advisory level.”
“I’m pleased to report that, based on state and national standards, our water is safe for drinking and bathing,” said Warren. “I encourage water consumers to continue to be guided by the EPA on water quality issues. The EPA is responsible for setting the legal limits for contaminants in tap water and overseeing overall water quality.”
The EPA, however, uses a lifetime 70 ppt “health advisory level” and not as a maximum contaminant level that the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection uses.
The DEP, as of March 31, 2020, has adopted 14 ppt MCL for PFOA and 13 ppt for PFOS plus 13 ppt for Perfluorononanoic Acid (or PFNA). Regular water testing to these MCLs began Jan. 1.
Orange water’s First Quarter 2021 results include PFOA levels coming in at 23 ppt– or 9 ppt above the state agency’s MCL. Mayor Warren, in the March 17 release, said that “the new solutions implemented over the next year will assist in removing PFOA from drinking water and getting the level down under strict NJDEP standard.”
WEST ORANGE – The 12-acre property whose address is 2-10 Ridge Rd., but is also known as The Ridge and the Loree-Bowood Tract, remains on the real estate market since the Township Council rejected its acquisition part of a legal settlement April 6.
The council, with its unanimous vote that Tuesday night, turned down the township administration’s settlement with resident/attorney Kevin Malanga. The agreement would have bought the land from Jordan Baris with money from the West Orange Open Space Trust Fund.
Council members felt that the township could not afford to maintain the property southeast of Prospect Avenue and Pleasant Valley Way. They also said that the benefit would be more for Malanga’s neighborhood than town-wide.
Malanga was relying on the West Orange Open Space and Recreation Commission’s Sept. 11, 2019 recommendation to have the township buy the property. The purchase would have preserved two carriage houses – one of which was for the Hecker family mansion – and some 800 trees. The said garages are all that is left of the Hecker flour family mansion and railroad executive Lenor F. Loree’s Bowood mansion, dairy farm and football gridiron.
It is thought that most of The Ridge’s housing was demolished between the 1940s and 1990s; Loree and Ann Wentworth Hecker respectively died here in 1940 and 41. The property was reduced to 12 acres when two assisted living homes were built in the 1990s.
Other projected benefits included controlling erosion from affecting the former O’Rourke Quarry cliff face and the Crest Ridge Apartments below plus remediating Pleasant Valley Way’s 20 mph elbow.
“The family who owns the land wants to protect their interests,” said Kevin Baris, “but if they can do something that at the same time benefits the community, they’d be thrilled.”
SOUTH ORANGE / MAPLEWOOD – The South Orange-Maplewood School District’s headquarters and 11 school buildings are being prepared for an April 19 reopening for the in-person part of the district’s limited Phase 3 hybrid learning plan.
The activity, including the installation of as many classroom ventilation filters SOMSD’s contractors can install before Monday, was launched after the district, its board of education and the South Orange-Maplewood Education Association reached a reopening agreement April 9.
The filter installations are meshing with the COVID vaccination of the district’s 800 employees. Many of these staffers are SOMEA-member teachers; teachers have been given vaccination priority by Gov. Phil Murphy since March 15.
Students in six grades plus new hybrid, English language learners and self-contained special education students, as outlined by SOMSD Superintendent Dr. Ronald G. Taylor, are to answer Monday morning’s school bell with the following details:
· Pre-Kindergarten-Second Grade students are to be in class twice a week.
· Grades Six middle school and Columbia High School’s Ninth Grade students return to in-person learning.
· ELL and Special Ed students of all grade levels are to attend four days a week.
April 23 will be the last Virtual Friday for elementary school students All teachers and staff are to report back to school Friday for the district-wide Asynchronous Day, to prepare for Phase 4’s April 26 start.
Phase 4 calls for five days a week in-person for PreK-Fifth Grade. ELL and Special Ed students. Middle school Sixth and Eighth grade hybrid students plus CHS Ninth and 12 Graders will be on four days in-person and Virtual Fridays.
District administrators and the teachers union are projecting a May 3 Phase 5 start. Phase 5 includes bringing Seventh, 10th and 11th Grade students who have not opted for all-virtual/remote learning back to classrooms.
BLOOMFIELD – The township joined Hackensack, Washington Township-Morris County, Bloomingdale and other municipalities in mourning the death of police chief and business administrator Ted Ehrenburg since March 31.
Ehrenburg, 64, of Blairstown, was Hackensack City Manager when he suddenly died at home. He had served as Bloomfield’s Township Administrator, between leaving Bloomingdale in 2012 and moving on to Hackensack in 2015.
Ehrenburg was hired on a 3-2-2 split vote by then-Mayor Raymond McCarthy and the Township Council. McCarthy – who objected, but did not veto, the vote – claimed that Ehrenburg had previously met the Bloomfield Democratic Committee Chairwoman. Ehrenburg also took a June-December 2013 temporary demotion to Assistant Administrator while the council sorted out a performance review.
Ehrenburg’s service as a municipal manager or administrator was his second career. The Randolph Township Special Officer joined Washington’s police department in 1978. He was promoted through the ranks over 28 years until he became its police chief 1995-2006, retiring to run his own law enforcement consultancy.
Ted Mark Ehrenburg was born in East Orange General Hospital Sept. 28, 1956 but was raised in Randolph. The RHS Class of 1975 graduate went on to an associate’s degree from County College of Morris, a bachelor’s in criminal justice from then-William Paterson College and a master’s in human resource management from Seton Hall.
The Rutgers-certified public manager is survived by wife Gina, son Mark, daughter Kate and seven grandchildren, among others. His Memorial Mass was held in Long Valley’s Our Lady of the Mountain Church April 7.
Contributions may be made to St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital Memorial Donation & Honor Program, 501 St. Jude Place, Memphis, TN 38105-1942
MONTCLAIR – State Superior Court-Newark Judge Jefferey Beacham is scheduled to consider Montclair Township’s request to stay his March 16 order, on allowing a rent control public question to be placed on a ballot, on April 16.
Township Attorney Ira Karasick, hoping to keep Township Clerk Angelese Bermudez Nieves, from scheduling the ballot question referendum, has filed requests to stay and appeal Beacham’s March 16 ruling on March 25 and April 5.
Lawyers for the petitioning Montclair Property Owners Association are hoping that Beacham stands by his March 16 ruling. The judge’s decision set a timetable where the township files an appeal within 20 days or schedule a special election on the question within 40 to 60 days. The latter timetable would have the MPOA-favored vote held between April 27 and May 18.
Beacham’s March 16 ruling, telling the township to get moving with the petition certification process, broke an impasse between Montclair and MPOA. Twice the landlords’ group filed their electronically generated petitions for certification – which the clerk’s office rejected after correcting the signatures and addresses.
The township reluctantly turned over its list of resident phone numbers and e-mail addresses after an earlier Beacham ruling last year. The township regarded the handover as a violation of privacy since the list was meant for reverse 911 calls. MPOA wanted the list, saying that the current pandemic has kept them from making door-to-door signature requests.
The township’s ordinance that established rent control, which the Township Council passed April 7, 2020, remains on hold by Beacham’s order.
BELLEVILLE – Mayor Michael Melham and Police Chief Mark Minichini are offering their entrance walks as an “Internet Exchange Safety Zone” since April 1.
Those conducting item sales on the internet can make their physical transactions in front of 152 Washington St. or its adjacent Police Headquarters entrance plaza.
By designating a neutral trading space within security camera range, Melham and Minichini intend to reduce the frequency of internet exchanges between strangers that have resulted in robbery or assault.
The zone’s signs point out that township employees are not witnesses to the transactions, nor available to vouch for items’ authenticity nor to settle any disputes.
