Eatontown Council Meeting: Borough Traffic, a Tour of Fort Monmouth Facility and Honoring Monmouth's Mock Trial Team

At its March 23 meeting, the Eatontown Borough Council discussed the following issues:

• The borough has coordinated a field trip on Tuesday, March 29 to tour the Mallette Hall building on Fort Monmouth. A bus will depart from the back lot at the borough’s municipal building at 10:45 a.m. and residents are invited to attend the approximately one-hour tour. The building is under consideration for becoming Eatontown’s new borough hall once the plans for reuse of fort property are implemented.
• Traffic continues to snarl two intersections along Hope Road in the borough between 4 p.m. and 5 p.m. each weekday, according to Mayor Gerald Tarantolo. Members of the borough’s Economic Development Advisory Committee are trying to address the problem by coordinating a synchronization of traffic lights at the intersections of Hope and Wyckoff Roads and Hope Road and Industrial Way West.
• The mayor and Borough Administrator George Jackson met recently with administration members from the Eatontown School District to review the proposed school budget that will be voted on in the upcoming school elections on April 27. “It looks like a very good budget,” said Tarantolo, who pointed out that there was no change in the amount of this year’s general budget over last year. Finance Committee Chairman Anthony Talerico expressed surprise that the meeting had taken place and said he would contact school administrators for a meeting with the rest of the borough’s finance committee prior to the budget vote.
• The borough’s administrator said he attended a gathering for the Monmouth Municipal Joint Insurance Fund and that following last year’s designation as a“most improved” municipality, this year the borough was at the top of the 18 other towns in its category (based on number of employees). Jackson said he didn’t know whether that would affect the borough’s rates in the future.
• The Monmouth Regional Mock Trial Club was honored at Wednesday’s meetings for advancing to the semi-finals round of the Monmouth County Mock Trial Tournament. The mayor and council honored the entire team, along with their faculty advisor Janice Kroposky and mentor Eugene Melody III, who is a local attorney and former Monmouth student.