S. Brunswick facing ‘brunt of developmental offense’
Just what eastern South Brunswick needed … yet another controversy. The continuing story of “not in my backyard, but over there is just fine.”
Much controversy has been involved with the planning of Route 92. Politicians have joined anti-Route 92 forces. Schemes have been devised by schemers to explain away the need for Route 92. One scheme is to extend Finnegan’s Lane to Route 130 right across from Davidson Mill Road.
A huge funnel will be created to squeeze even more traffic into our residential area. The same will be true for those residential areas adjacent to the present Finnegan’s Lane.
For every reason Route 92 shouldn’t be built, the same reasons apply to this area. Encroachment of critical wetlands, traffic diversion to residential areas, decreased quality of life issues, more property devaluation, huge construction costs, and the list can go on and on.
Sound familiar? People opposed to the problems created by Route 92 should also be concerned about the alternatives. After all, the same problems that you decry are supposed to be acceptable to us?
Two planned east/west roadways are in limbo. In addition to Route 92, NorthUmberland Way is partially constructed without a railroad overpass. It was supposed to connect to Route 130. Now officials want to pass a headache over to Finnegan’s Lane and Davidson Mill Road.
Eastern South Brunswick has faced and is facing the brunt of a brutal developmental offense. We don’t need another “scheme” in addition to what we face with warehousing.
I only hope our politicians remember we also live in South Brunswick and deserve the same consideration afforded to areas deemed “important” to protect.
William Klimowicz
Member
East Village Association
of South Brunswick
New bill will ‘give public false sense of security’
A3983/S2503, which changes licensing requirements for home inspectors, is not in the best interest of New Jersey consumers. This new bill would allow an 18-year-old high school graduate to obtain a full New Jersey home inspector license after less than three weeks in a classroom course and one week of field training.
This defeats the entire purpose of what the original bill was written for, to protect the home-buying public. This new bill will give the public a false sense of security when hiring a state-licensed home inspector.
Opponents argue there is a shortage of home inspectors — there is no shortage of home inspectors. If each of the 500, plus or minus, licensed home inspectors performs two inspections per day (500 inspectors multiplied by 250 working days per year), there is a capacity to perform 250,000 home inspections. Since there are about 140,000 home sales in New Jersey and about 80 percent get inspected, there is only a market for 120,000 home inspections per year.
The proposed bill cuts the existing 300 classroom hours down to 100. For more than three years, I have been teaching home-inspection classes and have found the current 300 hours of classroom study is the bare minimum number of hours required to cover the existing curriculums. Although 300 hours of class time may seem like a lot, there is simply no way to cover all the necessary material in less time.
The proposed bill would cut the 50 learning field inspections down to only 40 hours (about 15 inspections). There are far too many combinations of plumbing, heating systems, cooling systems, electrical systems, structural systems and plumbing systems out there for a student to gain an understanding of how they function during so few training inspections.
The alternate route for licensure where an inspector in training accompanies a licensed inspector on 250 home inspections will not produce fully qualified home inspectors because the inspector in training will lack the necessary classroom time and basic understanding of what is being inspected and why.
I oppose any postponement of the implementation date of the existing regulations because we feel it is unfair to the consumers of New Jersey and to those who have done the right thing and already become licensed. I feel the existing system will work well when the licenses are required after the end of this year, and we feel the law should be left as is until and unless proven otherwise.
Michael Del Greco
New Jersey home inspector
West Paterson