on school
Council declines to act
on school’s request
to clarify ordinance
By Sherry conohan
Staff Writer
SANDICARPELLO The Deal Yeshiva school has an application before the Planning Board to build two swimming pools and a playground. The school’s application has come under heavy fire from neighbors to the school, who contend that the additions will produce noise and traffic, and will generally disrupt their quality of life.
WEST LONG BRANCH — Deal Yeshiva’s proposal to build two swimming pools and a playground next to its Wall Street school, as well as its acquisition of other properties in the vicinity has riled several neighbors.
It also has given rise to a petition drive by the leading objector to the proposal.
For now, the proposal has been put on hold while both sides await the decision of the Zoning Board of Adjustment on whether to take jurisdiction of Deal Yeshiva’s application. The application was filed with the Planning Board.
The lawyers for both Deal Yeshiva and Joe Hornick, who has led the protest against the school’s plan for the pools and playground, were prepared to present planners on behalf of their respective cases to the board this week.
Ronald S. Gasiorowski, the Red Bank lawyer who represents Hornick and petitioned the Zoning Board to take over the case, was to present John Chadwick as his planner, while Peter Falvo, the Ocean Township lawyer representing Deal Yeshiva, was to present Paul Phillips.
Falvo also plans to present David Roberts, a planner with Schoor DePalma, to testify about what the intent of the Borough Council was when the ordinance allowing swimming pools at schools was passed a couple of years ago. He said Roberts worked with Jay Lynch, then the planner for the Planning Board, during development of the ordinance that the council later adopted.
Falvo explained that before that ordinance was passed, pools were only permitted at single-family homes and were covered in the general ordinance, for which there are no variances, rather than in the zoning ordinance, for which ordinances can be granted.
But when the ordinance allowing school pools was approved, the pool provisions were not inserted in the proper places in the zoning ordinance, he said.
Falvo also wrote a letter to Borough Attorney Gregory S. Baxter asking the Borough Council to pass an amendatory ordinance to clarify the swimming pool ordinance so that the Deal Yeshiva application could remain with the Planning Board, where he feels it belongs.
"It’s not only for my benefit," Falvo said in discussing his request. "It’s for the benefit of everybody who comes along" after Deal Yeshiva.
But when Baxter presented Falvo’s request to the Borough Council at its meeting last week, the council declined to act on it.
"His letter basically says we should change the ordinance because that’s not what was intended," Baxter reported to the council.
Councilman Richard F. Cooper Jr. responded that his feeling is that the proposed ordinance was published and everyone had a chance to comment.
"Now, with the controversy, it’s an inappropriate time to consider it," he said.
"They were here," Councilman William J. Boglioli noted.
"Say we decline," Councilman Joseph DeLisa instructed Baxter.
Gasiorowski contends that since schools are a conditional use in the neighborhood commercial zone, the swimming pool proposal requires Zoning Board action.
"He can continue his application before the Board of Adjustment, but the standards will be greater," Gasiorowski added.
"The ordinance says you can’t have a swimming pool in the front yard," he said. "That’s what he’s seeking to do."
Since the school is located on the corner of Wall Street and Monmouth Road, it is considered to have two front yards — one on Wall and the other on Monmouth. The school wants to put the new facilities in what it considers a side yard of the school, but which officially is a front yard.