MONTGOMERY: Township engineer seeks sidewalks policy

By Charley Falkenburg, Staff Writer
   MONTGOMERY — For as long as Township Engineer Gail Smith can remember, dealing with residential sidewalk repairs and maintenance has been a chronic problem in her department.
   With no official code to specify township and resident responsibilities, engineering officials continue to struggle with how to uniformly respond to the various situations involving cracked, broken or heaved sidewalks on residential properties.
   Frustrated with the lack of consistency, Ms. Smith came before the Township Committee on Jan. 17 to request they create an ordinance or policy to better guide the department in addressing sidewalk repairs and maintenance going forward.
   ”There’s nothing in the code to point to and say ‘you have to fix this,’” she told the committee. “I would like to see some sort of policy so I have better guidance to handle these situations.”
   According to Township Administrator Donato Nieman, Montgomery is only one of two municipalities in the county that doesn’t have an ordinance that addresses sidewalks. Rocky Hill is the other.
   Ms. Smith’s main beef was with broken sidewalks, particularly when they occur during a homeowner’s construction project such as septic repair, pool construction or a house addition. Many times the hired contractor will run over the sidewalk to access the site, crack it and leave the homeowner with the mess.
   ”Then we’re stuck with the broken sidewalk and it’s a lot of work to go after the contractor or homeowner to get it repaired,” she said.
   She added that even issuing summonses or denying approval for permits until the sidewalk is fixed doesn’t make much of an impact either.
   However, in some neighborhoods such as planned communities and townhouse developments, homeowners already financially take care of their sidewalks by allotting money in their homeowner’s association capital reserve fund.
   In addition to contractors, Ms. Smith said the sidewalks become damaged due to wear and tear and trees — particularly when the trees are between the curb and sidewalk and heave up the concrete. Regardless of the reason, she said her office often gets calls demanding the town to do immediate repairs and all too often they find the issue to be insignificant upon arriving.
   ”We go out there and it’s nothing,” said Ms. Smith. “For us to prioritize that, it just doesn’t make sense.”
   In regards to maintenance such as snow removal, Township Attorney Kristina Hadinger said that in New Jersey, unless there is an ordinance placing the responsibility on the homeowner, it becomes the municipality’s obligation. However, she added that a local requirement still does not bring civil liability on them for failing to maintain the residential sidewalk.
   Mr. Nieman said they didn’t really have an issue with residents not shoveling the sidewalks, but thought a uniform policy would still be beneficial.
   ”So if there is a certain circumstance where someone willfully creates a hazardous situation, we can at least say ‘hey, look, clean it up for us,’” he added. “It would be nice to have a legitimate basis to ask someone to do the work.”
   Committeeman Rich Smith said he understood where Ms. Smith was coming from, but wasn’t sure enacting an ordinance was the correct route.
   ”I think it’s a nuisance discussion. This takes her [Ms. Smith] away from doing things we pay her to do — like fix Cherry Valley Road,” he said. “But to go all the way to an ordinance that says ‘you have to fix your sidewalks’ is going too far.”
   Ms. Smith appeared open to compromising and suggested still having an ordinance to hold homeowners accountable, but to also have a policy where the town would automatically fix the sidewalks on road repair projects.
   Mayor Ed Trzaska appeared amenable to the idea of specifying according responsibilities so that town employees could use their time more efficiently.
   ”Over the years, we dramatically reduced head count so we have to make sure that the folks here are as productive as possible,” he said. “We need to continue to help them be more productive and focus on the bigger issue.”
   No decision was made, but Mr. Nieman expressed the desire to put together a draft ordinance for the committee’s consideration.