St. Mark's Church holds its Holiday Tricky Tray Saturday, December 5,
from 4 to 8 PM at the Wardlaw-Hartridge School. $25 admission gets 25
tickets. More info and tickets at (908) 447-3789.
Saturday, December 5, 2015
St. Mark's Tricky Tray Saturday
Friday, December 4, 2015
Tree Lighting tonight; Listening session on Youth Summit Saturday
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DPW crew strings lights on annual holiday tree Thursday. Photo courtesy Plainfield Recreation Division. |
Two important events for Plainfield today and tomorrow --
ANNUAL TREE LIGHTING
Kids of all ages eagerly await this annual event, set for this evening at 6:00 PM on the steps of City Hall.
As usual, there will be caroling, hot chocolate and giveaways for the youngsters. Santa's visit is set for 6:45 PM, when by custom he will arrive on a fire truck with lights and sirens.
This year, there will also be a special treat -- an opportunity for a family photo inside a giant snow globe. Families are invited to come to City Hall Library beginning at 4:00 PM to pose inside a giant snowglobe for a complimentary holiday photo. (One photo per family, while supplies last.)
The festivities are being organized by the Recreation Division.
MAYOR'S LISTENING SESSION ON THE YOUTH SUMMIT
Saturday morning, Mayor Mapp will host an important "Community Listening Session" concerning the upcoming citywide Youth Summit.
Residents -- especially young people -- are encouraged to come out and share their thoughts on important topics for this upcoming event.
Originally scheduled as a daylong event at Plainfield High School in cooperation with the Plainfield public schools, the district unilaterally notified Mayor Mapp just days before that it would not make the high school building or students available for the long-planned event.
The mayor may also expect to hear from residents about their reaction to the news that the Board of Ed is moving its election back to April -- the only school district in the state to do so.
The meeting gets under way at 10:00 AM in the Anne Louise Davis Meeting Room of the Plainfield Public Library. Light refreshments will be served.
The Plainfield Public Library is at Park Avenue and West 8th Street and is an accessible facility. Parking is available in the 8th and 9th Street lots and on College Place.
Thursday, December 3, 2015
Mayor Mapp's Town Hall tonight at Senior Center
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City Hall from the roof of the YMCA. |
Mayor Adrian O. Mapp will host a Town Hall this evening at the Plainfield Senior Citizens Center at 7:00 PM.
Topics slated for discussion are --
As always, there will be opportunities for questions and comments from the public, and other topics may be addressed.
- Unveiling of the city's new smartphone Mapp App
- Economic Development update by Carlos Sanchez
- Planning Division update by Bill Nierstedt
The Plainfield Senior Center is at 400 East Front Street. Limited parking is available in the lot off East 2nd Street. Mind that you do not park in residents' spaces! Additional parking on the street.
Wednesday, December 2, 2015
Plainfield's elected officials weigh in with blogs, too
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Elected officials' blogs are part of the quest for 'Just and Capable Government,' too. |
Several of Plainfield's elected officials also weigh in with blogs.
Councilor Rebecca WilliamsThese elected officials take the time to give thoughtful, considered opinions and information on issues facing Plainfield. Take the time to check them out.
Wards 2/3 at-large Councilor Rebecca Williams posts her thoughts on issues facing Plainfield and the larger world from a progressive perspective at And My Point Is: A Radical Vision for Plainfield. (Today, for instance, she has a post on the estimated cost of moving the Board of Ed election from November to April.)
Rebecca often discusses questions with which the Council wrestles, as well as noting important activities in the community and initiatives of the Mapp administration.
She also keeps a more personal blog, Confessions of a Bathrobe Blogger, where she mulls larger non-political issues, celebrates Plainfield activities and posts her haiku, demanding Japanese literary form.
Rebecca's day job, as a tenured professor at Essex County College, keeps her busy, but she still manages to be very active on Facebook.
Councilor Cory Storch
Ward 2 Councilor Cory Storch, just re-elected to a fourth term, is the 'dean' of Plainfield city councilors. Cory also served on the Board of Ed before coming to the council and has many years of service in elected office.
Cory blogs at Cory Storch for Good Government in Plainfield, where, true to his blog's title, he often takes up matters from a deeper, longer-range policy perspective.
Cory's day job as executive director of Bridgeway, New Jersey's largest mental health services nonprofit, keeps him busy day and night, but he still finds time to serve as the Council's designee on the Planning Board in addition to his Council duties.
Mayor Adrian Mapp
Though as mayor, Adrian Mapp now has a suite of communications options for staying in touch with Plainfield residents -- the most important of which is the excellent weekly email newsletter that goes out every Friday -- he still keeps the blog he began as a City Council member, Mapping It Out.
He uses that blog periodically to announce special events or to discuss community issues from a more private perspective.
Assemblyman Jerry Green
Assemblyman Jerry Green also keeps a blog to which someone in his office makes periodic updates, at Jerry Green's Page.
The blog primarily concerns itself with Assembly press releases concerning legislation of which Green is sponsor or co-sponsor and, during election seson, letters of endorsement for his re-election.
Jerry Green is now the longest-serving Assemblyman in the NJ Legislature and was re-elected Chair Pro-Tempore after the recent November general election.
Tuesday, December 1, 2015
Plainfield's blogs: An appreciation
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Workers on City Hall's cupola. Hoping to deflect lightning -- or attract it? |
Since Plainfield is mostly ignored by the media unless there is a shooting or a fire, I thought it important to follow up yesterday's post about the CLIPS blogroll with an appreciation of the Queen City's bloggers and the themes about which they write.
Bernice at Plaintalker II:
The 'dean' of Plainfield bloggers, Bernice Paglia has been posting almost daily (often more than one post at a time) since June 2005. She regularly follows City Council, the land use boards (Planning and Zoning) and the PMUA, with a sprinkling of other interests from time to time, including her garden and its preying mantises as well as her shopping exploits.
Bernice brings to her writing the focus and skills of an experienced journalist -- she was a longtime beat reporter for the Courier News and before that worked at Jan and Henry Johnson's weekly Plainfield Today newspaper (no connection to this blog), once published on North Avenue.
Scrupulous, thorough and even-handed, Bernice upholds the very best in journalistic traditions. You will not be well-informed about Plainfield issues and prospects if you are not reading her blog every day. (And it's typo-free.)
Olddoc at Doc's Potpourri:
Lifelong Plainfield resident, raised in the West End, Harold C. Yood, MD (affectionately known by his handle 'Olddoc'), is a retired physician who had a private practice in Plainfield and a long career at Muhlenberg Hospital.
For decades, he has been a regular presence at City Council meetings, where he often -- and still today -- raises issues that make elected officials squirm.
A raconteur, I nudged him years ago to write down some of his WWII stories, which he eventually did by starting a blog. But, true to his 'good government' inclinations, it wasn't long before his 'potpourri' blog began to take on his themes of good government, health care policy and his trove of interesting knowledge and lore (who else knows as much about asphalt paving as Olddoc? or has such an interesting collection of JAMA covers? or can relish decades of Texas Weiners?).
He is also the true geek among Plainfield's bloggers. He has converted many 35mm slides to stunning digital photographs (if you think that's easy, you should give it a try), upgraded all sorts of electronic equipment as the latest improvements become available and even uses a speech-to-text program on occasion.
Though mobility issues have crimped his style somewhat, you will not want to miss his point of view on life and happenings in Oz (as he calls Plainfield) and the world beyond.
Oh, and did I mention UVA basketball?
Jackie at The (TV) Show Must Go On...:
Jackie Schnoop is an award-winning amateur photographer living in Plainfield who regularly rides the Raritan Valley Line to and from work.
Her blog is followed by hundreds who share her enthusiasm for watching certain perennial TV favorites (especially Survivor and The Amazing Race)
While she is at it she regularly comments on Plainfield sights and situations. Her Sunday 'week in review' post keeps us up to date on her photographic excursions, sometimes startling animal poses and the goings-on of her companion Vincent.
Back when David Connolly was Plainfield's rental property kingpin (before taking a well-deserved trip to the slammer), Jackie shared some of the suffering of being one of his tenants. Jackie has also a sometime blog of her photos (see here).
David at Plainfieldview:
With more energy than his elder blogging colleagues, David Rutherford manages to have a career in New York as an architect, serve the community as an elected Board of Ed member, travel to interesting locales and stay in touch with the pulse of Plainfield's young people -- you know, the generation that will be running the Queen City in a decade or so.
Alone among the bloggers, David makes consistent and compelling use of his smartphone to make videos of City Council and other happenings of interest around town.
David also finds the time -- and energy -- to participate in the mass movements of our day, from anti-violence rallies in Newark and New York City to the Million Person March in Washington, DC.
Make it a habit to check in on him regularly.
Dottie Gutenkauf at Dottie G Sez:
Dottie is an old-time rabble-rouser and union activist (American Federation of Teachers) whom I met shortly after moving to Plainfield in the 1980s. She is also perhaps Plainfield's only current bona fide, certified Democratic Socialist.
Once Plainfield began to elect its Board of Ed members in the late 1980s, I worked with Dottie and others to bring nonpartisan slates of forward-looking and younger candidates to the Board of Ed. (Our victors included Cory Storch, Roni Taylor, Lynne Richard, Rick Smiley, Randy Bullock, and Wolde Woubneh -- Plainfield's once and only Ethiopian-American BOE member.)
When the struggle over Muhlenberg Hospital's fate moved to center stage, Dottie (along with Nancy Piwowar and others), helped rally the community to protest and prevent -- unsuccessfully-- the hospital's closing by its then-parent Solaris Health System.
Beginning her blog in 2008, Dottie has used it as a sounding board for community issues -- including Muhlenberg and Plainfield Democratic politics -- as well as her own poetry (which you should read).
A regular presence at Council meetings with her late husband Joe, Dottie celebrated her 82nd birthday this past week. Health issues have curtailed her presence at meetings and her blogging, but she is still the same old Dottie when you catch her on the phone.
Though she has switched to American Spirit cigarettes, which have no additives or chemicals, and which come in the brightest yellow package.
Noel at Plainfield Area Local Sports:
I met Noel through his brother Michael. Both have an intense interest in Plainfield's sports scene, including youth sports and scholastic teams (Go Cardinals!).
Noel had been writing some sports coverage for Augustine Dashiell's Plainfield Sports News and struck out on his own with PALS in 2014 when Augustine had to give up the blog because of the press of work.
Besides covering high school teams in the Plainfield area, Noel does in-depth interviews -- as with Plainfield High's new head basketball coach Milt Gaylord, who he spoke with last week.
If you are passionate about our young people's sports scene, you should be a regular reader.
Plainfield Latino:
The most recently begun blog is Plainfield Latino. Though "independent" candidate Norman Ortega seems to have begun the blog on his own, he was quickly joined by a coterie of a few other writers.
The blog focuses on issues its writers think are of interest to Plainfield's Latino community. During the election season, it became a sort of unofficial campaign blog for Ortega's failed run for the Wards 1/4 at-large Council seat.
Stridently anti-Mapp in tone, often with scant attention to the facts, I included the blog on the CLIPS blogroll after Mr. Ortega agreed that all posts would be signed with an author's name (honored somewhat in the breach).
Even though I believe there are more Latino opinions on Plainfield matters than are expressed here, its writers have a right to hold and present their views.
I will take up the remaining blogs -- by elected officials -- in a separate post.
These folks all labor (believe me, writing IS work!) to keep us posted on Plainfield's pulse. It is an invaluable service, for which they get little thanks. Visit their blogs -- and thank them, if you've a mind to.
Oh yes, Plainfield Today? Impertinent and snarky in nearly 7,500 posts since 2005.
Monday, November 30, 2015
Answering a reader's question about the CLIPS blogroll
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A question on the CLIPS blogroll. |
Many thanks to a Plainfield Today reader who sent along the following email suggestion about the blogroll appearing at the bottom of each day's CLIPS --
Hey Dan -- Just a suggestion . . . why not delete all those old clips in the "Recent Blog Posts" section. August and September and October are not really "recent." And they are old news. Just saying.So, is Dan just lazy or could there be another reason?
Way back in 2010, Courier reporter Mark Spivey noted the blog scene in Plainfield and that caused me to post review of the then 16 identifiable Plainfield blogs and their ranking in the webiverse (see here). That was in January; then in June along came two blogs published anonymously by teachers that focused on the Plainfield public schools (see here).
At a statewide conference on blogging and hyperjournalism, folks were astounded to hear how many active blogs there were in Plainfield. It seems that in most communities a single blog (or perhaps two) is the norm.
Folks wrote on a variety of topics, each blog with its own look, focus and voice. As time went by, some folks left Plainfield, some gave up blogging, some got busy with other things, some found ax-grinding too tiring, and several new voices were added.
We still have thirteen on the blog roll, though a couple haven't posted in months and maybe should be reviewed for removal.
How did there get to be a blogroll anyway?
In the beginning, I simply typed every entry into CLIPS every day and created a link. That got old very soon. It seemed easier finally to but a standard link to the blog in a template and just update the subject line whenever that author posted. Worked fine, but it was easy to lose trace of how long it had been since the last post -- so I started putting that date in parentheses at the end of the line to give readers a visual cue.
But the blogroll is not just a list.
It's a reminder that there is a long, ongoing conversation about Plainfield -- the good, the bad, the ugly -- that has been going on for over ten years, showing how passionate many of us are about our community.
Of course many Plainfielders are passionte about the Queen City and they show it in many ways -- from volunteering with community organizations to serving on boards and commissions to speaking out at Council meetings and much more.
But there are only a small number of those who toil by way of writing up their observations, suggestions and -- sometimes -- rants. I'm inclined to keep almost all of them on the blogroll -- no matter how infrequently some of them post -- as a reminder of the depth and value of this ongoing conversation.
Of course, I could also be lazy too.
Sunday, November 29, 2015
Christmas and Mid-Winter Stories at Drake House today
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David Emerson will explain where many of our Christmas customs come from and more this afternoon. |
Plainfield's Drake House Museum hosts a free program of "Christmas and Mid-Winter Stories" today at 2:00 PM.
History on the Hoof's David Emerson will entertain visitors with a lively romp through the origins of our holiday customs, the Victorian "invention" of Christmas as we know it, the popularity of the Christmas tree and more. You can learn more about History on the Hoof here.
Come and see the Drake House at its holiday finest. Light refreshments will be served. This program is made possible by a HEART grant from the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders.
The Drake House Museum at 602 West Front Street (at the foot of Plainfield Avenue) is open to the public Sunday afternoons from 2:00 - 4:00 PM, and at other times by appointment. For more information, call (908) 755-5831 or visit the website at www.drakehouseplainfieldnj.
Friday, November 27, 2015
Japanese department store's hilarious English gaffe (Warning: Adult language)
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Being hip in Osaka (image from Gawker). |
A little post-Thanksgiving Day marketing humor you might enjoy -- but be warned the language is "adult content".
Evidently reaching for the younger, hipper (and English-speaking) crowd, the marketing gurus at the Japanese store Gallerie mounted a blitz campaign with the above signs throughout the store.
The internet went wild (see Gawker stories here, and here), and the store management evidently was mortified, quickly changing the signage to a somewhat less graphic but still understandable form.
I am reminded of the high school French class joke about French-speakers being shocked at seeing signs in American stores declaring "Lingerie Sale" -- which, in French, means "dirty underwear".
Of course. And thanks, RW;)
Thursday, November 26, 2015
A Thanksgiving message from sports writer Max Ogden
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From Maxwell Ogden's Facebook post. |
Ogden posted the above photo on his Facebook page (see here) on November 23 and has received over 84,000 likes and 122,000 shares -- including my niece Sue Foust of Tucson, from whom I cribbed it.
Think about it this Thanksgiving Day.
Wednesday, November 25, 2015
Recreation seeks vendors for Holiday Crafts Fair
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Free vendor opportunity for Holiday Craft Fair. |
Plainfield's Division of Recreation is seeking vendors for its Holiday Crafts Fair slated for Saturday, December 12 at duCret School of Art.
There will be no vendor fees to Recreation for this event, however vendors will be responsible for a one-day peddler's permit ($25, from the City Clerk's office).
Handcrafted items, with or without a holiday theme, as well as items suitable for holiday gifts are being sought.
Jewelry, ceramics and pottery, quilts, knit goods of all sorts, hats, scarves and hair accessories, homemade jams and jellies and holiday baked goods are among the items shoppers will be looking for.
The Holiday Craft Fair will run from 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM, with vendors allowed to set up at 9:00 AM. The event will be in the auditorium at the rear of the school, entrance off the rear parking lot. duCret School of Art is at 1030 Central Avenue, Plainfield.
To register as a vendor or discuss your craft specialty, contact Beverly Calland at the Division of Recreation, (908) 753-3097 or by email at recreation@plainfieldnj.gov.
Tuesday, November 24, 2015
Council gets a perfect score at special meeting
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Patrick Torborg, developer of the proposed South Second Street project, explains his proposal to the Council Monday evening. |
After presentations on the proposed South Second Street and South Avenue redevelopment projects, Council got down to business with a perfect score of 39 unanimous votes on resolutions (two were withdrawn until the December meeting), and first readings on five ordinances -- including the PILOT for the South Avenue project.
Not that there weren't some painful moments -- the South Second Street property is a steal at $250,000 for 5 acres (the Park-Madison 4-acre parcel went for $1 million over fifteen years ago).
Councilor Gloria Taylor added un moment dramatique when she took a long pause on the South Avenue project before voting "yes".
And Councilors Diane Toliver and Vera Greaves got into a tiff over how clean downtown has become, with Toliver arguing it's pretty good and Greaves saying it's terrible.
I tend to side with Toliver on this one, though you can go downtown on Sunday after the stores close and find the trash barrels overflowing -- because the PMUA does not work on Sundays.
But that does not make Greaves right on the whole.
Municipal Clerk Municipal Clerk 'AJ' Jalloh's clever strategy of merging the double-header meeting into a single special meeting paid off nicely. Chairman of the Committee of the Whole Councilor Brown zipped along, asking if there was Council comment as she introduced each item. Thankfully, there was little.
Could this be a model of meetings to come?
Dream on.
Monday, November 23, 2015
Development: Land lust raising its ugly head again?
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Since this map was made in 2010, the Sears project is moving to completion with an addition containing more apartments and retail, and the Red Cross Building renovation on the other corner of Grove Street is under way. Parking in Lot 9 is essential to the success of both. |
Two items on tonight's Plainfield City Council agenda make me wonder whether land lust is raging again in the Queen City.
The first is a "discussion" item placed on the agenda by Council President Bridget Rivers and billed as "Conveyance of Block 47[sic], Lots 7 and 9 to Housing Authority."
This is the public parking lot at Central Avenue and West 2nd Street that snakes through to Front Street alongside the Pueblo Viejo restaurant.
I wrote about this public parking lot in last week's post on parking issues (see here), as public access to parking in this lot is key to residents who will be living in the Sears building renovation and expansion and the Red Cross building renovation -- both of which are currently under way.
As resident Alan Goldstein pointed out in a letter to Council members (see Olddoc's post of it here), there is a potential conflict of interest (the HAP chair is the daughter of an interested party) and HAP cannot purchase a property and the City cannot sell a property which is not part of a redevelopment plan.
We learned after the last go-round with this deal that HAP's executive director had not consulted his board about the proposal, and that it was all tangled up with HAP's so-called "independent" nonprofit CDC.
However suspect the conversation is, I do not think -- as Goldstein does -- that this is a quid pro quo.
However, there is a reason to worry, and that is found elsewhere in the agenda, with Resolution 446-15, the sale and developer's agreement for the South Second Street property between Plainfield and Grant Avenues.
The really troubling item here is the sales price, noted by Bernice (see here) as $250,000 -- that's for a parcel in excess of 5 acres.
You may recall that the Park-Madison parcel, which was only four acres -- though in a choicer location, was sold to the UCIA for $1 million, "as is", with the UCIA responsible for soil remediation.
And that was more than 15 years ago! Are we to assume that real estate values have gone down so much over the past 15 years?
Plainfield taxpayers have a right to know how this sales price was arrived at.
And to my mind, the real worry is that if some plan goes forward involving Parking Lot 9 on Central Avenue, the so-called "developers" will want a lowball price like that of South Second Street.
City Council's special meeting gets under way at 7:00 PM tonight in the Council Chambers / Courthouse at Watchung Avenue and East 4th Street.
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