‘Feel good law’
bad for Lawrence
To the editor:
Hooray for state Superior Court Judge Linda Feinberg’s ruling to stop the enactment of a Lawrence Township municipal minimum wage ordinance.
The Lawrence Living Wage Coalition’s support of raising the minimum wage in Lawrence Township from the state’s minimum of $7.15 per hour to $11.08 plus $3.50 per hour in benefits, a total of $14.58 per hour, will hurt all Lawrence residents. Those 1,054 people who signed the coalition’s petition are under the misguided perception that businesses can be taxed without affecting the consumer. They are wrong. Requiring businesses that are among the largest employers in our township to pay double the state’s minimum wage will force those employers to make some very reasonable business decisions.
First, these billion-dollar-per-year businesses will have to compute how much they can raise their prices to begin to pay for this additional cost of doing business while still remaining competitive. Then, they will have to compute how many present employees to let go in order to make up for the shortfall. Then, if the numbers are still in the negative or consumers go to other businesses to save money, they will take their losses for a time while they look for a more business friendly location. When they move, Lawrence Township will lose the taxes they now add to the municipal budget every year.
Such a feel good law creates a truly lose-lose situation. We consumers will definitely have to pay higher prices for the same goods and services, some currently employed people will lose their jobs, and Lawrence Township may lose some very good tax ratables in the foreseeable future. All of a sudden, this law doesn’t feel so good anymore.
Bruce D. Seaman
Johnson Road
Larger mall more
valuable than hospital?
To the editor:
It seems as if some of the elected leaders in Lawrence Township would rather pave the way for a major mall expansion than a new hospital.
They are not interested in a new hospital and Councilwoman Pam Mount even went as far to declare, after the state approved the Certificate of Need for CHS to build a new hospital in Lawrence, that "zoning and planning will not be changed" (The Lawrence Ledger, Aug. 10) to accommodate a new hospital. How can she be so certain of that? Anyway, it appears the town council will soon seal the deal on changing the Master Plan to accommodate an 80-percent increase in the Quaker Bridge Mall. They’re concerned about the traffic a new hospital and cancer treatment facility will cause? What about adding even more traffic to that side of town? Why has the council not demanded a detailed traffic study from the mall developer? How about all of the municipal services the mall requires including response to shoplifting and vehicle incidents? Incomprehensible.
Maybe the knowledgeable Hopewell officials will let the Lawrence Town Council review the economic impact study they are having done to evaluate CHS’s potential move to their town. I’m sure the hospital will be welcomed there after the Lawrence officials arrogantly reject it and the economic study reveals all the benefits of having a local hospital.
By the way, what municipality as large as Lawrence doesn’t have zoning anywhere in the township for hospital use as part of their Master Plan? Just across the river in Pennsylvania, a municipality would be at risk for a lawsuit for lack of an appropriate variety of zoning within its confines such as this (i.e. curative amendment).
With all this concern over the traffic a new hospital might cause, I hope our elected officials are collaborating with West Windsor on the potential traffic nightmare once the mall adds 100 new stores and West Windsor develops the 653-acre Wyeth tract on the other side of Quakerbridge Road, which is in the planning stages. Certainly the residents of this area of Lawrence deserve as much consideration to traffic concerns as other areas of Lawrence. Is a mall expansion more valuable to the citizens of Lawrence than convenient health care? Maybe a referendum is in order so we can see what the people really want.
Lynne McMullin
Danielle Court
Woods group’s goals:
to preserve, enjoy
To the editor:
We appreciate this opportunity to respond to last week’s article on the Lawrence-Hopewell Trail (LHT).
Our organization is committed to two goals: preservation and public enjoyment of Carson Road Woods. To these ends, we have organized various activities. Perhaps most visible has been our opposition to a paved, 10-foot wide lane across this natural area. This is how the LHT was initially proposed to cross Carson Road Woods; four years later, that proposal remains substantially unchanged, despite wide ranging concerns of residents who live various distances from the property.
Many of our other activities have gone unreported by this paper and unnoticed by much of the community. Even before Carson Road Woods was preserved, volunteers began building a network of walking trails traversing the entire property of its farm fields, meadows and woodlands. The last section of trail was opened after two years of work, extending the Carson Road Woods network to more than six miles in length. These trails have been maintained by volunteers ever since. Last year, the Friends of Carson Road Woods were awarded a grant by the National Trails Program to further improve these trails for year-round access. Since September 2005, volunteers have spent more than 1,350 hours fulfilling this goal. Visitors can find trail maps on our Web site and in map boxes at the preserve’s two main entrances.
Our goals are twofold: preservation and public enjoyment. We have labored continuously and carefully to advance both, without sacrificing one for the other. We are convinced it is possible to maximize public access to Carson Road Woods while minimizing its permanent disturbance, thereby enhancing the preserve’s overall value to the community. We continue to oppose the LHT through Carson Road Woods as currently proposed: paved, 10-feet wide and across the property’s center. At the same time, we continue to maintain and improve six miles of existing walking trails so all who wish can enjoy the preserve’s natural beauty.
Bob Hunsicker
Carson Road
Mark Rudnick
Karena Lane
Sharon Miller
Carter Road

