By Jennifer Kohlhepp, Managing Editor
CRANBURY — The township may create an official Facebook page.
Deputy Mayor Dan Mulligan suggested the town put together a weekly newsletter and a Facebook page during a discussion about policies and procedures for posting information to the township’s website at the Monday night meeting.
The Township Committee scheduled a workshop session regarding posting information to the website after recently having a Zoning Board application for a change of highway property use that many residents showed interest in knowing about. Beyond sending email alerts out about upcoming meetings regarding the project, the township could not notice the public beyond what is standard for municipal land use law.
Mayor James “Jay” Taylor suggested coming up with a policy for notifications regarding land use applications, such as limiting notifications to those about applications seeking use variances. He also wanted to talk about how the township was notifying the public about recreational activities and events and public meetings.
Currently, the township sends out an email with the meeting date 10 days prior to a meeting and the meeting date as well as a link to the agenda the day of a meeting.
Mr. Mulligan said, “We should start a township Facebook page. At a certain age you don’t check email. You’re on Facebook.”
Committeewoman Susan Goetz said, “To get information out is one thing but when you are talking about regulatory boards (like the Planning Board and Zoning Board) you have to be fair and equitable.”
Committeeman David Cook said the township puts the agenda link out there to eliminate having to pick and choose what to send out.
“Releasing the agenda more than once may be the way to go,” he said, adding that he thinks there would be liability in picking and choosing what to release and how often to release it.
Deputy Mayor Mulligan said the township has to make sure items that are being emailed out aren’t being bunched together in a format that people don’t want to read.
“We have to make sure individual emails are going out,” he said.
He suggested sending out individual emails about upcoming meetings as well as a weekly newsletter about meetings dates, activities and events.
The committee decided to create a subcommittee to confer with the township’s webmaster and lawyer on the issues.
