To the editor:
As concerned Hillsborough residents, we must speak out against the proposed 400,000-square-foot Hillsborough Promenade development plan, recently approved by the Planning Board.
For the last few years, Democratic candidates for Township Committee have stridently campaigned on an anti-development, traffic-alleviation platform.
So we find it disappointing that our Democratic Mayor Tricarico, while a committeeman, voted to approve the zone change for the Promenade site, and now as Planning Board member has voted again to approve this massive mall, which will bring 20,000 more cars a day onto the already inadequate Route 206.
This hazardous prospect, which has caused the state DOT to put a 120-day hold on the project, is clearly not in the best interests of Hillsborough’s residents.
It’s also not in the people’s best interests to have an important part of their government ignored by a developer.
Yet our mayor, as a Planning Board member, has allowed this developer to run roughshod over Hillsborough’s Environmental Commission, ignoring its requests for full information, even though the state DEP has expressed areas of environmental concern about this project.
Now that the 120-days hold has provided the opportunity, we call on the Planning Board to reevaluate the issues, and the best interests of their fellow township residents vote against the Hillsborough Promenade in the current form.
Anthony Gwiazdowski Jr.
Saxson Street
Neshanic Station
Mike Avolio
Van Zandt Drive
Hillsborough
The writers are the Republican candidates for Township Committee.
