20230112 - CBDAC Minutes
Central Business District Advisory Committee (CBDAC)
Meeting Minutes – January 12, 2023
Thursday, January 12, 2023 8:30 – 10:00am
In Person in the Village Hall, Senior Lounge, 1st floor
Members of the Public are Welcome to Participate
Members Present: Philip Davis; Tom Hillmann; Jacqueline Luthcke (Chief of Police); Stacey Tsapatsaris; Glenn Carlough; Pam Perron (VC liaison); Steve Aspero; Jordan Kaufman (CBDAC Chair); Stephen Del Percio; Anastasia Bamberg (CSAC liaison)
Guests present: Paul Vagianos
Administration
- CBDAC approved December 8, 2022 meeting minutes (noting correction for mailing address for Guild; 55A E. Ridgewood Avenue, #1).
Updates
- Village Council
o Pedestrian Plaza and dining corrals approved by VC; mid-May until at least mid-September. Unlikely to extend year-round.
o Dining corrals all 7 days; plaza only weekends with perhaps Fridays beginning in the fall.
o Concrete safety blocks will be used to mark off plaza for 2023 – VC/Chris R. hopeful to have bollards in 2024 after supply chain issues resolve.
o Village is not funding the plaza, which costs around $10K/week to set up/administer. CBDAC (Stephen Del Percio lead) will look into how other NJ peer towns have funded their pedestrian plazas.
o “Downtown NJ” is a good resource for this type of information.
o Tom Hillmann notes that signage is critical to alert visitors from outside Ridgewood that the plaza is happening – otherwise people will just leave.
o General agreement that Village struggles with communication – for that reason, hiring a permanent Comms person is on the table. Idea is to solicit a volunteer for “Village Information Officer” before position actually exists to get ball rolling. Councilmember Siobhan W. has formed a subcommittee on how to improve our comms.
o CBDAC also agrees that an entry banner would be a great addition to our downtown, at the intersection of Maple and E. Ridgewood Avenues. Decorative lighting too. Issues/obstacles are bus clearance height (could banner go on a side street?) and PSEG utility poles.
- Chamber of Commerce
o 100th anniversary this year. Plan is to be more “strategic” in 2023 and also get more people involved with the Chamber this year.
o Paula Gavin has been a great resource to help with planning – she will also talk to CBDAC. She is a civic leadership consultant who works across New Jersey with similar towns/organizations.
- Guild
o No Guild update this month.
- CSAC
o Pedestrian markings on Union Street to be improved.
o Currently looking at street safety signage height issues. The brackets on lampposts are too high for the safety banners to be well seen.
o Coordination with County on various projects is always challenging (i.e. Franklin Avenue repaving over Thanksgiving). But in general our relationship with the County is very good right now.
- Train Station Pedestrian Tunnel Subcommittee
o Waiting for good weather to kick off painting/cleaning with Chris R. Meeting on 1/29/23 to discuss mural options and next steps.
o The State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) approval is needed for the artwork (tunnel is from 1913).
Discussion
- Finish Prioritizing the Master Plan Downtown Recommendations.
o Steve Aspero and Jordan Kauffman are preparing a memo for CBDAC’s review prior to presentation to the Village Council. It will list our top five recommendations to prioritize in the Master Plan (see December 22, 2022 minutes – land use changes; aesthetics; flexible streets/curbsides; communications; and parking).
o Pam Perron is spearheading effort also identified in Master Plan to streamline various Village processes (i.e. building permits) and speaking with Village Manager re: same.
- Main Street designation- Steve Aspero presents to CBDAC
o New Jersey has various enabling statutes for SID/BID (special/business improvement districts); Main Street designation; and Transit Village designation.
o There are more regulations for Main Street designation than creating a SID/BID. This designation sits “above” a SID/BID and provides grants that are focused on physical improvements to downtown cores. However, although the state may close the Main Street program it did fund $1M in grants in 2022.
o Transit Village is also a grant program. Municipality must meet certain transit-related requirements. But there is not much competition; only a few towns in New Jersey have the designation and the program doled out $3.8M in grants in 2022.
o Note that Montclair and Princeton both have SID/BIDs, Chambers of Commerce, and the Main Street designation.
o CBDAC observes that the “managed downtowns” in NJ all look really good, and we want to emulate this here in Ridgewood.
o Complicating factor is that Ridgewood’s Chamber and Guild are 501(c)(6) organizations, which means they cannot apply to state for grant funding.
o CBDAC also noted that many SIDs fail (Rutherford a high-profile example) due to administrative requirements and existential threat the SID/BID can pose to existing civic organizations (like chambers of commerce, etc.)
o Jordan Kaufman and Stacey Tsapatsaris suggested a new 501(c)(3) organization with a permanent employee where the Chamber and the Guild each have a board seat. Once the memo mentioned above prioritizing the five Master Plan items is finalized, it could become the mission of this new organization, which can in turn apply for funding, etc.
o CBDAC agreed that there is no downside to investigating Transit Village status for Ridgewood; there is a pre-application meeting where the program would assess the Village’s prospects if it went through with the application.
New or Old Business
- Next CBDAC meeting is on February 9, 2023 (via Zoom)
Respectfully submitted by Stephen Del Percio
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