From the issue of April 26, 2007.
Acknowledging volunteers’ response
To the editor:
As the storm of April 15 headed toward our township, the men and women of our volunteer fire companies were busy getting their equipment ready.
The pumps were checked and started they were distributed amongst the various apparatus for better response, and the boat was checked, in case it was needed, ropes and rescue equipment were made ready and lots of time was spent.
The storm hit us Sunday and the calls began to come in for assistance. All the fire companies had something to do. Pumping basements, checking and retrieving people from their submerged cars, evacuating families from their homes and bringing them to safety.
The fire companies worked from Sunday afternoon until Tuesday, around the clock.
Then, Tuesday night, they began going into Manville to assist them with all the cellar pumping required. On Wednesday some firefighters were still out there assisting neighboring towns.
I would like to thank all the volunteer firefighters and rescue members for all their great work in time of need. To sacrifice your time and energy for someone you don’t know is a very special quality that need to be recognized and acknowledged.
Ron Berju
Chairman,
Board of Fire Commissioners
Voters thanked for budget OK
To the editor:
On behalf of the Hillsborough Board of Education, I wish to express my heartfelt appreciation to the voters of Hillsborough for their support of the district’s 2007-2008 school budget.
Be advised this is the fourth consecutive year in which the budget has been approved by the citizens of Hillsborough and, thus, the board and the administrative team is most pleased to have garnered the support and confidence of the voting public.
To all who assisted in highlighting or networking information relative to the budget, we thank you. We thank the staff who assisted with regard to voter registration initiatives and additionally extend kudos to all students and staff involved in Kids Vote.
Special appreciation is extended to the Hillsborough Beacon for its editorial of April 5 in support of the budget and the Hillsborough Education Association for their assistance in coordinating a candidate forum and for networking information relative to the contents of the budget.
In closing, I wish to congratulate the newly elected members of the Hillsborough Board of Education: Frank Blandino, John Donnadio, Gregory Gillette and wish them much success in their service to the community.
Dr. Karen A. Lake
Superintendent of Schools
Hillsborough School District
Donnadio thanks voters for support
To the editor:
Thank you for your support on April 17th and the privilege to serve our community on the Hillsborough Board of Education.
Your words of encouragement over the past several weeks meant a great deal, and I look forward to the opportunity of working with this board on several important issues.
I will do my best to make sure that we save valuable taxpayer dollars by sharing services and resources more effectively, engage in a comprehensive superintendent search to find an excellent leader, and communicate on a regular basis with teachers and parents about the education our children.
John G. Donnadio
DeCamp Drive
Watchdog group needs to step up
To the editor:
I was quite pleased with how the voter ratio turned out on the school budget election. Not so much because the election passed, as that was just a quirk of the numbers, but rather what the numbers say about the communities general emotion.
No one will dispute the assumption that the first 900 votes for the budget were cast by employees of the school system, their spouses, and immediate members of their family who are old enough to vote. These are the few people who benefit financially from a "yes" vote.
If you disregard these so called "bias votes" then what you have left is a very clear picture of a township that’s very ticked off at the financial running of the school system. Almost everyone has heard the news about what the teachers union did down in Trenton to destroy property tax reform legislation and the numbers are now just begining to reflect peoples anger.
My buddy over at Concerned Citizens for a Better Hillsborough is in complete agreement with my assessment. He told me that for the past 5 years the leaders of CCBH have been telling their members to "Tightly bite their tongues" about any formal complaints they may have about the Hillsborough Education Association or their parent union the NJEA.
They feared the HEA might retaliate by running a smear campaign against CCBH, a well documented tactic often used by the NJEA to discredit politicians.
However, with the recent sabotage of the property tax reform talks by representatives of the teachers union, I’m told many CCBH member attitudes are now changing. Unofficially, they’re apparently ready for a political fight. Many of the part time members want the CCBH leaders to declare a formal statement of protest against the teachers union to get the ball rolling.
It’s going to be very interesting to see if the leaders of CCBH, known in their charter as "The Watch Dog Group of Hillsborough," either maintain their cowardly positions by continuing to remain silent with their vast complaints about the teachers union or respond by taking on the Hillsborough Education Association in the same way they took on former Mayor Joe Triarico back in 2000.
For those who don’t recall, CCBH back around the year 2000, spent hundreds of personal man hours and literally tens of thousands of donated dollars fighting the former mayor and the Township Committee from converting half the township into shopping centers.
As important as that was, that issue didn’t even come close in intensity to affecting people in the way that the teachers union has over the past few years.
If anything, they should be ready to pull out the political battleship cannons for this issue.
Mickey Lucano
Farm Road

