PLUMSTED PLUMSTED — Herb Marinari has been named to a seat on the five-member Plumsted Township Committee and will serve on the governing body through 2012.
A seat on the committee became available recently after committee members voted to replace Committeeman Steve Reed, who had a series of unexcused absences from municipal meetings.
Because Reed is a Republican, the Plumsted RepublicanMunicipal Committee had the right to present the governing body with the names of three people to be considered for the opening.
The committee presented Marinari, Vince Lotito and Joan Cuba-Richardson as its three selections for the appointment.
On Dec. 7, Marinari was named by the members of the Township Committee to replace Reed.
Marinari has served on the Plumsted School District Board of Education at various times since 1983. He was expected to resign from the school board on Dec. 14.
He said he believes his service on the school board will help him make the transition to being a member of the municipal governing body.
“I’m not worried, because [having been] a school board president, I was highly involved in legislative work. I’m not a novice in that aspect,” Marinari said.
Marinari said that as a member of the governing body, he will focus on financial issues facing the municipality.
Marinari also said he wants to forge a stronger bond between the school board and the committee. He said that in the past, the school board and the committee met several times a year to discuss issues that involved the school district and the township.
A school board “just doesn’t want to go to the Township Committee when it needs its budget passed. [A school board] goes to the committee every three months to discuss pertinent information — surely about shared services. If we get a chance to sit in a room and just talk, you are going to have nothing but a positive for both the committee and the school board,” he said.
Commenting on Marinari’s appointment to the governing body, Mayor Ron Dancer said, “Herb is an individual who has great name recognition in the town that he has earned.”
Marinari will finish Reed’s term by serving through 2012. In November 2012 he will have the option of running for a full three-year term on the committee (2013-15).
The other two residents who were considered for the appointment, Lotito and Cuba- Richardson, were appointed as alternate members to the Plumsted Land Use Board.
For Marinari, who was diagnosed with a rare form of stomach cancer in the early
1980s and given six months to live, serving his community has been one of the main things that pushes him forward.
“Alot of that ability to move on was the ability to know that I had a town here. In the brief time [I had] to know these people, it allowed me to move forward,” Marinari said. “I put everything I could into this community. I always will until I’m not here or I’m not breathing.”
In other news, the committee swore in Gary Schaal as a new full-time officer with the Plumsted Police Department. Schaal, who has been working as a part-time officer in Plumsted for two years, was one of 70 people who applied for the full-time position.
Sgt. Matthew Petrecca said Schaal’s promotion fills a gap left by the departure of Officer Chris Quackenbush.
“This move is fiscally sound and we will continue to work together with the committee to make this agency work,” Petrecca said. “My concern is the safety of my residents and my officers.”
— Contact Andrew Martins at [email protected].