TOWN WATCH
NEWARK – An interesting thing happened on the Jan. 10 Municipal Council Meeting Agenda while Newark’s elders unanimously approved granting registered 17- and 16- year-olds the Newark Public Schools board member and budget elections vote. The measure would add up to an estimated 7,200 people on the restricted registration rolls.
The council, that Wednesday afternoon, passed Bill 23-1158, introduced at their Dec. 20 meeting, allowing 16 and 17 year olds to register to vote on the third Tuesday in April. Newark becomes the first New Jersey municipality to allow that conditional suffrage effective in 2026.
Those who were not present or watching TV-78 live Jan. 10, would have to watch a video recording of that meeting to know who spoke in favor of conditionally lowering the voting age.
There were 25 registered people to speak in Jan. 10’s public hearing of citizens – including NJ Institute for Social Justice President Ryan Haygood and daughter Charity Haygood. R. Haygood was also among the 23 pre-registered public speakers for the Dec. 20 meeting.
People’s Organization for Progress President Lawrence “Larry” Hamm, NAACP-Newark Branch President Deborah Smith Gregory, High school junior Breanna Campbell, Micauri Vargas, Esq. of Vote16NJ and Kaleena Berryman, late of Rutgers-Newark Abbott Leadership Institute, also pre-registered to publicly speak Jan. 10.
It is presumed, going by the Dec. 20 and Jan. 10 meeting agendas alone, that the mentioned speakers advocated for the 16- and 17- year old school board vote. Those two agendas, unlike earlier ones, did not publish the speakers’ topic. Going by the printed material alone, one does not know how many public speakers were actual 16 and/or 17 -year-old NPS students.
The Municipal Council passed the measure after holding a second reading, a public hearing and holding a public hearing of public citizens that Wednesday afternoon after 12:30 p.m. Its introduction was held Dec. 20 – a Wednesday night.
The question becomes whether the Jan. 10 hearing and presumptive passage could have been postponed to the next Wednesday night – Jan. 24. Holding the second reading and hearing then would allow the affected 16 and 17 year olds to speak without having to obtain an excuse from their school or risk an unauthorized absence.
IRVINGTON – Some of those who looked at Newark Police Division’s Jan. 12 release of 14 fugitives arrested on outstanding warrants may have done a double take and said “You, Again?” to a township resident’s name and mugshot on the list.
Newark Public Safety Director Fritz Frage listed Camarrie P. Sherwood, 22, as having been arrested in Irvington as part of NPD’s Crime Reduction Initiative.
Sherwood was arrested for criminal mischief, possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose and unlawful weapons possession. Frage did not elaborate on what and how Sherwood got NPD’s attention.
Sherwood was also among 19 who were arrested in a similar sweep Aug. 15. She was arrested on the 100 block of 21st Street on counts of aggravated assault by shooting, weapons possession and conspiracy. Details of that arrest and that case’s disposition were not immediately available.
Irvington Rite-Aid Closed
“Local Talk” has learned that Rite Aid corporation had thoroughly closed its pharmacy here at 35 Mill Rd. as of Nov. 7. The former Mill Run at Union Apartments’ anchor store has had its signage removed. The last “Local Talk” Rite-Aid is now 104 12th Ave. in Newark.
EAST ORANGE – State-funded renovations for the East Orange Public Library have closed its main branch here at 21 South Arlington Ave. for most public services Jan. 16- 27.
While a Tech Q&A session will still take place Jan. 17, for example, the Jan. 16-17 crafts sessions and the Junior Lego Club’s Jan. 17 and 20 meetings have been canceled. What public services will be available 9:30 a.m. – 6 p.m. Jan. 16-27. Virtual services via eLibraryNJ, Kanopy and Hoopla will be available 24/7.
Some patrons have noticed access to the second floor and some other areas, where renovations were being done, since last fall. The work was thanks to a $500,000 award given to EOPL by the New Jersey State Library in 2022. It, and the Newark, West Orange, South Orange, Maplewood, Belleville and Nutley public libraries were awarded statewide shares of $20.714 million that were raised by a 2017-19 N.J. Library Construction Bond Issue.
The current EOPL-Main Branch opened in 1973 to replace the 1903-built Carnegie-funded library two blocks to its east. The latter library building was repurposed as the East Orange Municipal Court.
Carnegie’s EOPL generosity included funds to build the Franklin Branch (later Jersey Explorer Children’s Museum) in 1909 and the Elmwood Branch in 1912. The Ampere Branch, not covered by the steel magnate’s foundation, was modified from a fire station in 1931. All three branches were closed by 2020.
ORANGE – 410 Main St., after eight decades’ banking, will lose its last tenant, PNC Bank, after Feb. 15.
PNC has listed Feb. 15 as its last earliest day to use the ATMs off Lincoln Avenue or on the southeast corner of Main Street and Scotland Road. It has already ended night deposit services here and has ended Saturday retail banking hours since the COVID-19 pandemic’s abatement. Safe deposit box holders have until Feb. 9 to vacate or have their contents removed to its branch here at 35 Main St.
Months-old mail has accumulated inside the entrance for the building’s long-gone second and third floor office tenants.
The Mid-20th Century office building had opened in 1961 as a National Newark & Essex Bank branch until that banker became Midlantic by 1979. It became a PNC branch in the 2000s.
Both PNC signs are redirecting customers to their “MLK & Greenwood Branch,” at 35 Main St. Customers were earlier redirected to here from their Brick Church Shopping Plaza, East Orange branch while it was replaced with 35 Main St. here in 2022. (The 1974-era Midlantic Brick Church branch at Dr. MLK, Jr. Boulevard and S. Harrison Street made way for the under construction The Crossings at Brick Church project.)
What will become of 410 Main here after Feb. 15 remains an open question. There were pre-pandemic suggestions of replacing it and its 20-space parking lot with a parking garage for the Orange Recreational, Educational and Cultural Center across Main Street.
The building remains owned by ARC Panjoh54 LLC/National Tax Search, 130 S. Jefferson St., Chicago. Customers may want to check with PNC to see if their neighborhood branch is being “consolidated.”
WEST ORANGE – Funeral arrangements are being made for a township rapper whose voice was silenced by a crash on the Kansas Turnpike part of I-70 Jan. 10.
Damian Osborne, 24, said the Kansas Highway Patrol’s crash log, was driving west on the highway when “for an unknown reason,” his 2004 Buick Century went off the road’s left hand side at Milepost 208.6. The marker is in Leavenworth County, about 20 miles west of Kansas City, Kan.
Osborne’s car struck a roadside sign pillar one mile west of the Lawrenceville Service Area. First responders said Osborne had died at the scene. KHP said he was not wearing a seat belt at the time.
Osborne, said his producer and engineer Augy Jan. 11, was driving to Los Angeles. They had released a 2 min, 37 sec. video, “Remember” last year, whose “TheyKnowDame” scenes were shot in Newark’s Ironbound, Jersey City and Lower Manhattan.
Augy is producing a posthumous album with its proceeds going to Osborne’s family.
SOUTH ORANGE / MAPLEWOOD – The South Orange-Maplewood School District had filed a bias complaint against the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association over a player disqualification during a Jan. 4 basketball game here.
SOMSD is asking for an investigation of an NJSIAA referee during the Columbia High School Lady Cougars’ hosting the Caldwell Chiefs. Acting Superintendent Dr. Kevin F. Gilbert has sent a copy of the complaint to the N.J. Division of Civil Rights.
The referee, according to the complaint, had disqualified a CHS player from the first quarter over her wearing beads in her hair SOMSD Athletic Director Richard Porfido went over to the referee that same quarter and reminded the official that the National Federation of State High School Associations had allowed athletes to wear hair adornment since 2022.
NFSHSA revised their rule after the state had passed The Create a Respectful and Open Workplace for Natural Hair – or CROWN – Act in 2019. The CROWN Act makes the regulation affecting how a person wears his or her own hair a basis for discrimination.
The CROWN Act was passed after a Buena Regional High School wrestler was forced to cut off his dreadlocks or face a referee’s disqualification from a match Dec. 19, 2018. Assemblywomen Shanique Speight (D-Newark), then-Assemblywoman Britnee Timberlake (D-East Orange) and then-State Sen. Nia Gill (D-Montclair) were among S-3945’s primary sponsors.
The referee lifted the player’s disqualification. The Chiefs went on to beat the Cougars 46-37. The Lady Cougars held a 2-5 win-loss regular season record as of Jan. 6.
A group calling themselves Students Voice for Peace conducted an hour-long walkout after Columbia High School’s Third Period onto Ritzer Field Jan. 12. The unofficial group, who left no contact addresses, said it was a protest of what the Hamas health Office said were over 23,000 deaths of Gazans in the wake of Hamas’ killing about 1,200 people in southern Israel Ovt. 7 Details, when available, will follow in the next edition.
BLOOMFIELD / GLEN RIDGE – A car collision by the Bloomfield/Glen Ridge border left two people injured and a gas station pump felled here Jan. 3.
Township Police. Fire and EMS responded to a car accident report from 717 Bloomfield Ave. just after 2 p.m. that Wednesday. They arrived to find a late model four door car having stopped several feet short of the Jonas Automotive Center/Enrite office storefront. They found Enrite’s eastern gas station pump on the ground.
A preliminary accident investigation determined that the car was heading west towards Glen Ridge when it had collided with another vehicle. The driver lost control and knocked down the pump.
Two people were seen being treated by Bloomfield EMS before being taken to a local hospital for evaluation. Enrite’s western pump, as of Jan. 13, remains operational but the eastern pump site has been covered by a wooden board.
Enrite/Jonas was the Glenfield Service Station for decades. It goes back to Walsh’s Esso in 1941.
MONTCLAIR – When the late Dr. Anthony P. Caggiano was asked about his greatest career accomplishment, the 33-year obstetrician and gynecologist would say, “assisting 7,000 women bring new life into the world.”
Caggiano, 84, a Montclair practicing physician and OB-GYN instructor, died in Woodland Park Dec. 12. His Funeral Mass and entombment were respectively held here at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church and North Arlington’s Holy Cross Cemetery Dec. 16. Arrangements were made here by Caggiano Memorial Home for Funerals.
Caggiano first came to the Montclair area to attain his undergraduate degree from Seton Hall University but left to attend the Georgetown University School of Medicine. He completed his internship and residency in Newark City Hospital – Martland Hospital Unit before taking a Vietnam-era tour of duty with the USAF.
Dr. Caggiano, after two years’ caring for wives and relatives of Altus (Okla.) Air Force Base pilots and airmen, returned to the Montclair area for good. He was an attending physician at Glen Ridge’s Mountainside, Belleville’s Clara Maass, Newark’s Columbus and Livingston’s St. Barnabas hospitals.
Over time, Dr. Caggiano became Mountainside’s Director of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Clinical Assistant Professor of OB-GYN at Newark’s New Jersey Medical School, and president of the Associated Physicians of Montclair, the Essex County Medical Society and the Medical Society of New Jersey.
Once he put away his physician’s shingle, Caggiano became a Clinical Associated OB-GYN Professor at UMDNJ-NJMS and as an American Board of OB-GYN Examiner. The avid golfer was proud of his three holes-in-one at the Glen Ridge Country Club and dedicated some of his time and service to Paterson Catholic Charities’ Straight and narrow program.
Sons Anthony III, Marc Anthony and Erik Francis; daughters Tracy Lyn, Dawn Pier and Danielle Maria; sister Ann Marie, nine grandchildren, longtime companion Rachel D’ Amore and her family are among his survivors. Memorial donations may be made to St. Jude’s Hospital.
BELLEVILLE – The Belleville Public Schools issued a re-registration announcement to district parents Jan. 5 – three days after its new Board of Education Trustees were sworn in and reorganized.
What BPS is asking for are documents akin to what the NJ Motor Vehicle Commission requires of new and/or renewing licensed drivers. They need to present one “primary document” and “at least three secondary documents” that will add up to at least eight qualifying points.
What will count as a primary document will be a deed or a mortgage statement, a continuing certificate of occupancy or a written lease agreement. The three secondary documents are to come from “two 2-Point Documents and no more than two 1-Point Documents.”
Two-point documents are to come from: voter registration, licenses, permits, court orders, financial account information, property tax bills, government documents, contracts of sale and/or utility bills. One-point documents include: delivery receipts, canceled checks, benefits statements, state agency agreements, insurance claims, medical claims, counselor or social worker assessments, employment and/or unemployment documents.
The presentation of documents and re-registration is part of the public school district’s check on school enrollment — that students and their parents or legal guardians are who they say they are. Those who fail re-registration may be asked to pay out-of-district tuition. This periodic process doubles as a check on illegal apartments or similar dwellings.
New members Lissa Missaggia and Benda Pacheo (the latter by Mayor/A Better Belleville Campaign Manager Michael Melham) were sworn in as new BOE Trustees Jan. 2. Gabrielle Bennett-Meany and Nicole Coviello-Daddis were respectively named Board President and Vice President.
NUTLEY – A township family has established a GoFundMe.com page to help pay for their son’s medical expenses and mortgage while Belleville authorities are looking for the driver who struck him at one of their intersections on Dec. 9.
Belleville Police and the family of John Demmer III said that the latter was riding his motorcycle when he and a late model Subaru Forester collided at Washington Avenue and Little Street 1:40 a.m. Dec. 9. He was then run over by a second vehicle.
The Forester – believed to be a 2023-2019 model with a black trim and orange striping “sport package” – continued without stopping. The video camera did not pick up the vehicle’s license plate. The Subaru in question may have some passenger side door damage from the motorcycle’s impact.
Demmer was rushed to a local hospital ICU and has had two surgeries as of Jan. 13. The son of Nutley Historian John Demmer II has since been transferred to a local rehabilitation facility on Dec. 19.
Father and Nutley Historian John Demmer II said, on Jan. 14, that the GoFundMe page has raised over $8,000. Although the medical insurance company has renewed his son’s $3,000 deductible, the father said that the page intends to cover equipment not covered by insurance and his mortgage.
Anyone with information regarding the collision and/or the Subaru in question are to contact BPD Capt. Frank Pignartaro at (973) 450-3426.
New BOE President, VP Named
Salvatore Ferraro – after being sworn into his second Board of Education term with Salvatore Balsamo and Lisa Danchak-Martin – was named its latest Board President here Jan. 8. Member Joe Battaglia was named Vice President for the year.
