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The Times of Scotch Plains-Fanwood

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THE TIMES

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NEWS & EDITORIAL

Scotch Plains, Fanwood and BOE Deserve Pat on Back For Exploring Shared Services

The Scotch Plains and Fanwood governments, along with the Scotch PlainsFanwood Board of Education, all deserve a pat on the back for the good example they have set on the issue of shared services. Back in February, Mayors Martin L. Marks of Scotch Plains and Louis C. Jung of Fanwood, joined by School Superintendent Dr. Carol B. Choye, announced the formation of a ninemember advisory committee to, in Mayor Marks’ words, “investigate the possibility of sharing services, personnel, land and buildings.”

The idea of communities sharing the expense of certain services is certainly a good one, given that local residents have been paying an increasing proportion of the cost of their local government as state assistance has declined in recent years. And the Whitman Administration has been urging New Jersey towns to look at the sharing of certain services as a way to pare the cost of local government and save overburdened local property taxpayers some money.

The Scotch PlainsFanwood committee has held two meetings, and it was heartening to recently hear Scotch Plains Councilman Tarquin Jay Bromley, one of the Township’s three representatives on the panel, praise its members’ energy and enthusiasm about their task of forming recommendations for areas where services could be shared and expenses pooled.

Other initiatives in this regard are beginning to crop up as well. Union County’s S. L. A. P. (Sheriff’s Labor Assistance Program) initiative, which makes nonviolent offenders available to localities to per form certain jobs, has led to discussions between

Scotch Plains, Westfield and Clark about the possibility of sharing the expense for this program. The costs for the coming refurbishment of the Hetfield Avenue bridge that crosses over the New Jersey Transit railroad line will be shared by Scotch Plains and Fanwood, with the rail agency kicking in half of the expense. There have also been other contacts between municipalities in the area about where certain services could be shared.

Obviously, all government services and operation can’t be shared, but wherever there are functions and services that are being unnecessarily duplicated, localities, in the name of sparing their property taxpayers any additional burdens, should investigate. The Scotch PlainsFanwood advisory committee has taken the bull by the horns in this regard, having already identified a few dozen areas of possible cooperation and focusing its attention on five or six of those areas.

Their task will be made a bit easier by officials in Trenton, who, for once, are putting their money where their mouth is. Instead of just paying lip service to the shared services idea, the Whitman Administration is also making available some grant money to allow towns to retain consultants to assist them in their work.

Any ideas that save local taxpayers money is worth looking into, and we hope that the Scotch PlainsFanwood advisory committee on shared services continues to build on the momentum and energy it appears to have and comes up with some ideas that result in a lessened burden on its taxpayers.

Letters to the Editor

PALACE

In the 15th century, King Henry VIII of England started renovating some old castle fortresses that dotted the English countryside. By removing the threeinch archer’s windows and other features, which at an earlier time, had facilitated the defenses of these structures, the fortresses were transformed into palaces, such as large country homes suited to the nobility. It was the Romans, however, who gave us the word palace.

Augustus Caesar, the first emperor of Rome, had a home on the Palatium or Palatine Hill. The French converted Palatium to palais. But this word construction does not end here.

The etymological foundation for Palatium and, therefore, palace is the Latin word palus, “a fenced enclosure used for grazing animals.” So, a palus was originally a pasture, which seems like as good a place as any to build a palace. It is also a good place to leave this word history, but please close the gate on your way out!

A distressed mother writes:

I’ve been divorced for several years. My husband remarried and lives in another state. Twice a year, our two children, ages 12 and 10, fly out to see him. When they go, I go into a depression. My thoughts are that I may never see them again, that they will prefer to live with their father and his new wife, that he will buy them toys and gifts I cannot afford, and that they will end up loving him more than me. There is no real basis for this. We have a wonderful relationship and they always come back missing me. Is there any way I can make it easier on myself?

Answer:

You are not alone in this difficult situation which affects so many families involving visitations between parents, whether local or out of state. As a parent who offers her children love, security, safety and consistency, you feel a potential loss when the children visit the “other” parent and seem to have so many needs met — another family with children, toys galore and rules which may be more “permissive.” Your children will not love you less nor want to stay with their father.

I recommend that you try to focus on relationships and activities which will give you pleasure while you are alone. Take this opportunity to go out with a friend (or friends), go to a movie, a show, have dinner, go to a mall, a museum, a walk, a shore trip. Relax, slow up a bit, exercise. You will need your strength to greet the children when they return and “enjoy” being a parent again.

A distraught wife writes:

One year ago, after being married for 10 years, I found my husband in bed with my best friend. “Kyle” (disguised name) cried and asked for forgiveness. I had little problem throwing my friend out of my home and my life. Kyle said that “May” had been flirting with him and he was foolish and would never trespass again. A month ago I found out that he had had an affair with a coworker 10 years his junior. At first he denied the affair, then admitted to it, saying the young woman was spontaneous and he had had the best sex ever, while I was too “rigid and puritanical.”

I became furious and demanded we seek marriage counseling. After two visits, he told the therapist he should go see a “shrink’” himself My husband felt the marriage should continue for the sake of our children. I believe in preserving a marriage and so I reluctantly agreed to this, with the demand that my husband remain faithful (he swore to do this on his children’s lives).

The other night he came home fairly late (“ I was stuck at work”) and promptly tossed his clothing into the hamper. The next day I found lipstick smears all over his shirt. Later that evening, I took out an old Connie Francis song and played it to him (It’s called “Lipstick on Your Collar”) and I revealed to Kyle that I knew he was fooling around again. I’ve had it. Should I take him to marriage counsel

HUNG UP!!

By Milt Faith, Executive Director

Youth and Family Counseling Service

Divorcee Should Take Care of Self When Children Go to See Dad

ing again? I am very pessimistic.

Answer:

The writing is on the wall: your husband continuously acts out his unfaithfulness and lying patterns of behavior — with a friend, with a young coworker, etc. Then he rejects therapy with the excuse that the therapist needs help. He follows this up by laying a guilt trip on you regarding children needing a mother and father. A child needs a mother and father who are loving and caring, parents who provide faithful, honest and loyal role models.

Unfortunately, your husband lies and cheats and you go along with his manipulations, thereby permitting his abuse of you. It is about time that you confront the situation and realize that your husband will continue his behavior. You have to protect yourself. You may want to consult a lawyer now and start making plans to free yourself from this abusive situation.

If you listen to the key words of the Connie Francis song, you will know what to do: “Lipstick on your collar

Gonna tell on you Lipstick on your collar Said you were untrue Bet your bottom dollar you and I are through

’Cause lipstick on your collar gonna tell on you.”

A frustrated mother writes:

Please help me solve this unusual situation. My mother has the strange habit of buying her Christmas gifts early in the year and storing them in the attic. Recently, my 6yearold son went into the attic, found some of the gifts, played with, and broke some. My mother is furious. I feel she has an obsession to buy gifts so early and she is to blame partially for leaving them easily accessible. She is even implying that I should replace some of the items. I promised to abide by your decision, I cannot believe that you would agree with her, but if you do, I agree to replace the broken gifts.

Answer:

Start saving your money and start shopping. Please read this carefully: Why is your 6yearold roaming around alone in the attic? Why do you feel that buying gifts early in the season is inappropriate and an obsession? People frequently do this to save money and/ or to buy a special gift that someone may truly like. You may not have the opportunity to see the gift again. I do not feel that your mother is partially nor totally responsible for what happened She has a right to do what she wants in her house. So please refocus your thinking, get off her back, set limits with your son who should be taught limits, and start replacing.

Turn to National Day of Prayer For Help With Crime, Violence

Humane Society Salutes Congressmen For Animal Protection Issue Votes

Remove Brightwood Park From Lists Of Future Development, Writers Say

Westfield School Board President Thanks Public for Support, Vote

More and more crime, violence, fear and hopelessness permeate our culture. We are living in a nation which has been blessed above all others and yet we are finding ourselves in a moral decline.

We read one news report after another full of horrible things people do to one another and now we have begun to reap the ultimate harvest, the poisoning of the minds and lives of our children. The glaring examples of children raping children and kids tuning their well refined video murdering skills to real handguns is absolutely evil.

How long will it be until the good people of this nation use the power they possess to take back our communities and our kids? For the sake of our children we must look at what we can do right now to begin turning the tide, encouraging that which is good and letting them know that some things are morally wrong and unacceptable. If we can’t stand for what we know is best for them how can we expect them to be strong

when they have moral choices to make? We should all be joining today, May 4, National Day of Prayer events to seek His forgiveness.

Peggy Cowan Fanwood

On behalf of The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) and its 7.3 million supporters nationwide, I commend Representative Bob Franks, Senator Frank Lautenberg and Senator Robert Torricelli for achieving perfect scores of 100 on our 1999 HSUS congressional scorecard.

Representative Franks sided with animal protection concerns on all six issues we scored during the First Session of the 106 th Congress. He voted to cut funding for an ineffective U. S. Department of

Agriculture program that spends millions of the taxpayers’ hardearned dollars — as a subsidy to livestock ranchers — to kill bears, mountain lions, foxes and other predators with inhumane traps, poisons and aerial gunning. He also voted to restrict the use of cruel and indiscriminate steeljawed leghold traps and neck snares on National Wildlife Refuges; to protect dolphins from tunafishing boats that use dolphindeadly nets; and to prohibit commerce in videos that depict animal “crushing” and other appalling acts of cruelty.

He also cosponsored legislation to combat the gruesome practice of cockfighting and to protect farm animals injured at stockyards. Senators Lautenberg and Torricelli, on similar issues before the Senate, sided with animal protection concerns at every opportunity.

Mohandas Gandhi once said, “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” Indeed, you can tell a great deal about the compassionate impulses of elected officials by assessing where they stand on animal protection matters.

The HSUS applauds Representative Franks, Senator Lautenberg and Senator Torricelli for their consistent and principled support for animal protection in this session of Congress.

Wayne Pacelle Senior Vice President The Humane Society of the United

States

Editor’s Note: This Letter to the Editor also was sent to First Ward Councilman Carl A. Salisbury.

* * * * * We request that the Town Council permanently protect for future generations the treasure which is Brightwood Park. Let’s take it forever off the list of possible targets for development of any kind.

If we don’t, there will be no end to the assaults on it. The Recreation Department’s illconsidered proposal to cram playing fields into the Park was turned down just last year. And now Norman Greco proposes the same kind of inappropriate incursion into the last remaining natural area in all of Westfield.

In the name of “saving money” he proposes that the Elm Street playing fields be paved over for an “employee’s parking lot,” creating yet another hideously ugly “field” of asphalt two blocks away from the Broad Street stores. The location almost assures that employees would only use it if forced to do so. And we all know that shoppers would still cruise around waiting for someone to leave an onstreet parking spot rather than have to walk that far.

There is no parking, flat ground or existing access road in the part of Brightwood Park coveted for these playing fields. Their already very expensive construction would then put more traffic

and parking pressure on the surrounding neighborhoods or be the reason for turning adjacent parts of Brightwood Park into even more parking lots.

Were this to happen, there would be no reclaiming the lost wildlife habitat or the botanic diversity present in Westfield’s unique park. Nor would it be possible to reclaim the status of Westfield as a town which cares about the priorities of “all” its citizens, not only the “jockocracy.” Many of us hold the conservation of nature to be as important as athletic fields. It would be a shame if our town spent money to destroy forever an irreplaceable natural area.

Janet and Paul Somers Westfield

On behalf of the Westfield Board of Education, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to the Westfield community for voting in favor of the 20002001 school budget. The 2 to 1 vote was once again an affirmation of the community’s support of education.

Important initiatives in technology, curriculum, facility upkeep and teacher training will take place in the new school year to prepare our students for the future.

I would also like to thank the Finance Committee, particularly Michael Kessler — the chairman, for months of work in finetuning the budget. Congratulations to Michael, who will serve a oneyear term on the board.

Congratulations to Anne Riegel and Carol Molnar who were elected to con tinue their valuable service on the board.

Welcome to Kimberly Rhodes, our newlyelected board member, whose financial background and service on the Citizens Advisory Committee on Capital Projects, will be a great asset to the board.

Thank you to Thomas Taylor, who has given six years of service to the community by serving on the Board of Education. Thanks also go to Peter Billson for seeking a seat on the Board of Education with great interest and enthusiasm.

It is gratifying to be part of a school district where caring, dedicated citizens continue to volunteer, making education a priority in Westfield.

Darielle Walsh President Westfield Board of Education LaPolla CoChairman Takes Issue

With Letter Writer’s Comments

Mr. Golush took time to respond to my letter of March 30. Perhaps if he had taken just a bit more time and given more thought he might have written a far more accurate and honest response.

It is totally false and dishonest to accuse me of being anything but cordial

and polite to Maryanne Connelly during our trip to Israel. We dined along side each other on several occasions and shared in friendly conversation. We also shared a crowded cab ride, laughing all the way back to our hotel. My basic personality is such that I am a friendly and outgoing person. I know of no other way to be. Had David Golush and I come face to face April 21 as we sat in the same row of the movie theatre I would have been cordial to him.

As for questioning county finances, the county taxes have not risen in the last six years of a Democratic majority while increasing services. That is not a claim the Republicans could make when they controlled the Freeholder board.

Mr. Golush is to be commended for his business success and I particularly respect him for his philanthropy. However; it was never an issue that I raised or questioned.

Mr. Golush, I don’t have any Democratic bosses as you erroneously stated But, I do have competent leaders and wonderful friends like Michael Lapolla. Our families have celebrated many special occasions together. Last week, the Lapolla family shared a place with our family at our Seder meal. Obviously, Mr. Golush doesn’t understand that true friendship transcends politics.

I have come to know and respect Jon Corzine not as a hero as David Golush asserts, but as a fine and decent gentleman. If he claims never to have made any offer to Maryanne Connelly to leave the race, I believe him. Until she came forward with what I believed to be a false charge, Jon and Joanne Corzine were both firmly supporting Mrs. Connelly and had contributed to her campaign.

Mr. Golush, another of your inaccurate statements is that I have been a Democratic activist since the days of FDR. I wasn’t old enough to vote for president until 1956 when I proudly cast my vote for Adlai Stevenson. That’s 12 years after Roosevelt’s last run. Again, you missed your mark.

Mr. Golush, I’ve scanned the headlines and read all current Letters to the Editor and try as I might I couldn’t find one black sheep taking issue with an old and often used cliche. How petty and foolish can you get? Also, anyone who questions my political correctness might just as well be standing in front of a fast moving train. My success in party affairs speaks for itself. I have been elected by my peers from all 21 counties in New Jersey to represent them to the Democratic National Committee. I am now serving in my fourth fouryear term. I have been selected because of my ability to relate and interact well with others.

Lastly, as for getting to the truth you can believe whatever Maryanne Connelly has chosen to say. I, however, believe my trusted friends.

June S. Fischer CoChairman of the Lapolla for

Congress Campaign Scotch Plains

Letters to the Editor

Various Groups Thanked for Help

Preparing Taxes

On behalf of the American Association of Retired Persons, the Internal Revenue Service and the New Jersey Division of Taxation, I would like to thank the directors and staffs of the following organizations for the use of their facilities to allow our volunteers to give free assistance in preparing income tax forms for senior citizens and low income families:

Scotch Plains Library, Westfield Community Center, St. Helen’s Roman Catholic Church Parish Center, Westfield Library and Scotch Plains and Westfield Senior Housing Buildings. Also, thanks to TV channels 34, 35 and 36 and local newspapers. Through their cooperation, we prepared over 1,100 tax returns and assisted over 800 senior citizens and low income persons.

Ed Evans Volunteer and Local Coordinator of

Tax Aide Program Scotch Plains

Salute to Frank Thiel Extended From One Who Knew Him Well

This is in regard to the recent death of Frank Thiel. I’m sure that everyone who knew Frank will continue to celebrate his life, and I wanted to share some of the truly exceptional and spiritual qualities about him that touched my life.

Many of the locally based area Realtors (former Westfield Board of Realtors members from and including the equally respected towns — in alphabetical order — of Clark, Cranford, Fanwood, Mountainside and Scotch Plains) have been in the business since the 60’s and 70’s. Although in competition on a daily basis, we do have a mutual respect for each other gained and played out over the years often working long hours, doing what is necessary, to assist people in their pride of home ownership and investment. Frank and Betty Thiel have always been at the top of this list.

He made sure you knew exactly what his position was without using a steam roller, without equivocation (no “pussyfooting” or waffling), and without the need to posture and selfaggrandize. He always took responsibility for his actions and the actions of those under his leadership. He literally accepted where the “buck” stopped and knew when not to place “any” buck above some other important things in life. So, what else could anyone have to learn from him? Such an open book — no smoke and mirrors here!

Frank never wasted his time, energy, or motion on negativity. It just didn’t occur to him that there might be a “down” side to a person or situation. I swear it never even existed for him! I came to know Frank even better over the last few years and think how sad if there’s someone who never got to meet him or know of him. There is no finer example of a true “gentleman.”

So sad and too bad if you never heard of or experienced the smaller, less complicated, less high tech world of The Westfield Board of Realtors — a classic example of why people should know and study where we’ve been in order to truly assess where we are in relation to the world and things in general. Yes, we continue to have to make changes, be more high tech and go forward and go faster and train the brain to retain more. Even so, however, we all must recognize that some things can still remain the same in some way, and it’s okay to not let go of all the older things — like the golden rule — all of the time. Here’s a salute from a lot of us to Frank Thiel and his wife of many years, Betty. After all, beside every great man, there is surely a great woman!

Loretta Wilson Westfield

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