JACKSON – Traffic concerns about Brookwood Parkway has led to some residents to criticize the police – and others to praise it.
Resident Mordechai “Mordy” Burnstein spoke during the public comment period of the meeting. He disagreed with several public comments made during a prior meeting.
“I took offense to one or two or maybe three or four of the things that were said and I really want to address really one point that was constantly mentioned by one of the residents during the last council meeting.”
He noted a council member advised the public that when “there are issues after hours (concerning code enforcement) the residents should reach out to the PD (police department),” Burnstein said.
Burnstein said the response that was given by a resident was, “the PD doesn’t do anything. It was brought up that there were speeding buses allegedly going through Brookwood One – which is where I live – and again the response was to call the PD which is generally what you do in a safety issue. The wording was ‘nothing will get done over there.’ I take offense to that especially now in our country when unfortunately, police departments in the country are under attack.”
The resident said his experience living in Jackson for “six long years is our police are second to none. We have a great police department. Whenever there has been a public safety issue, they have been down there right away.”
“The men and women in blue do a great job. I’ve had instances where I’ve had to call the PD on a public safety issue and they were down there right away, and took it very seriously. I don’t appreciate a long-time resident of the town coming here and attacking our PD,” Burnstein said.
Burnstein also said the idea of closing Brookwood Parkway, which is being studied would “cause a bottleneck on New Prospect Road and “create safety issues for emergency vehicles because they’d have to go farther to get into the neighborhood. As a resident of the neighborhood, I strongly oppose it.”
In other news, Council Vice President Martin Flemming reported on the recent fire district elections and the passage of their budgets. “We are getting two new fire trucks in town.”
Ordinances adopted on second reading included one that established a cap bank for the township, a budgetary regulation that many other towns are doing at this time.
A second ordinance concerned prohibited conduct in areas of township parks and recreation facilities. A third ordinance approved concerned increased penalties for storm water violations.
An add on to the consent agenda was the appropriations and to accept the solicitation of bids for the hiring of a public relations professional for the township.
