Local Red Cross Volunteer Assists Jackson Fire Victims

No sooner had my wife gone to bed last night than she received a call from the American Red Cross activating her for disaster relief assistance in Jackson. She hopped into the Red Cross vehicle she's been assigned while she's on Rapid Response duty this week and made the half-hour trip to the scene, as did several other members of the team. She personally issued food, clothing, and other supplies to three families and made arrangements for one with small children to be put up in a hotel for the night. She got home after 5 am and took a nap before heading off to work a couple of hours later.

If you want to make a difference in your community, consider becoming an American Red Cross volunteer. Reach out to our local chapter in Tinton Falls to find out about the many ways you can help.

Check out these discussions of the fire and community response at Jackson NJ Online:

• American Red Cross Provides Assistance to Jackson Families
• Investigators Seeking Cause of Valentine's Night Apartment Fire in Jackson
• Multiple Alarm Fire at Jackson Green Apartments Updated

Trenton is Low; Loews Is High

There was an awful traffic snarl on Hope Road at Route 36 in Tinton Falls yesterday afternoon. My wife and I were having lunch at Applebee's after returning her Red Cross vehicle at the end of a hectic volunteer weekend for her. Two lanes of backed up traffic were turning the corner to enter GSP Exit 105 southbound in lieu of Route 18, which was still closed. Our waiter at Applebee's said he had a devil of a time getting to work from Long Branch that morning and might as well stay the night to make sure he could make it to work for the early shift. APP blames the problem on a late announcement of a state of emergency by Trenton. An earlier warning might have kept many motorists from having to spend the night in a shelter.

The Red Cross housed many of our region's hapless travelers at the Loews theatres at Monmouth Mall. The operator on duty is to be commended for his sense of civic responsibility in the crisis. Be sure to thank Loews for taking in strangers in their time of greatest need.

A Fun Day Off in June

I had the day off today, so my daughter and I went to the Twin Brook Golf Center in Tinton Falls today to play miniature golf. The 18-hole course is interspersed with waterfalls and flowing streams. There's even a cave at the ninth hole. I was on my game today, I must say. From there we went to Belmar and had lunch at the Boathouse Bar and Grill. We were hot from playing golf, so we ate inside, but it was a bit dark. I'd recommend eating at a table on the patio out front. On our way home we stopped in at the Matawan Starbucks, where my wife joined us for coffee. My wife and I are having pizza in tonight while my daughter and her beau head out to Red Bank for the evening.

News Updates as of 23 May 2010

• As of 3:06 pm, Brookdale Community College is winning 2-0 in the first inning over Monroe in the 2010 NJCAA Division III National Softball Tournament championship game at Rochester, Minnesota.
• Matawan boys track team was leading Central Jersey II after 7 events at the NJSIAA Sectional Track & Field Championships at Tinton Falls on Friday, per APP. Dylan Spadaccini won the 400 m hurdles; Tyrone Smith took long jump; Andre Hodge won shot put; and Brian Ramcheran outpaced the field in the 400 m.
• Texas State Board of Education continues to memorialize its conservative social bent, affecting our schools' text books for years to come. I've marked the New York Times article on the subject for you, but many others exist.
• Be alert to the security concern that public copiers and fax machines now have hard disks that can store copies of your documents. Read this discussion at NYTimes, which cites this CBS News video.
• Friends of the Matawan Aberdeen Public Library have learned that the library's elevator is still not operating because Trenton didn't immediately authorize the work permits, even though the elevator company asked for expedited permit approval and the money was overnighted to Trenton. The state has 20 days to handle the permit processing and provide the permits. Work is scheduled to begin on 28 May 2010.
• MAPL Friends will soon be collecting book donations again. The book sale is ongoing across from the front desk.

• I've heard that the Keyport Waterfront Grand Opening was relatively lightly attended this afternoon. Maybe it started out slow because of all the inevitable political speeches? The music didn't start right away, except for some bagpipes. I imagine things will pick up once the music gets going. Food starts around 4 pm.

Red Cross Disaster Relief Needs Your Continued Support

The Disaster Team at the American Red Cross Jersey Coast Chapter has been very busy this past quarter helping victims within our region and throughout the state. The chapter could use some donations to replenish its supplies and to continue to fund its various disaster programs. Check out some of what the chapter has been doing lately:

The chapter is delivering hundreds of clean up kits this afternoon to storm victims in Bound Brook, where the Red Cross has been sheltering victims for about a week.

The chapter provided temporary housing for flood victims rescued by boat from their apartment development along Beers Street in Keyport last week. Be sure to thank the Holiday Inn in Hazlet for their support of Red Cross disaster assistance. They not only provide discounted temp housing through an arrangement with the Red Cross, their staff are ultimately patient and cooperative when disaster victims need community support the most.

The chapter set up a shelter yesterday in Waretown after brush fires in Barnegat forced evacuations.

The chapter provided disaster relief at the Ocean Grove fire a little over a week ago. The Red Cross provides aid to rescue workers as well as victims.

The chapter sent a volunteer to Strathmore Elementary School in Aberdeen to accept a large donation from the students, who conducted a Relay-a-thon fund raiser for the American Red Cross's Haitian Earthquake Relief Fund. The presentation of the check was covered by News 12 New Jersey.

The chapter delivered cots and supplies and helped run several shelters in and near Cape May in response to a disabling snow storm in early February that forced local residents from their private homes and senior centers. Disaster relief involved some volunteers traveling in a blinding snow storm through drifting snow in Red Cross vehicles specially equipped to the task, while others manned a command center 24/7 in Tinton Falls to help coordinate the relief effort.

Volunteers and paid staff meet regularly to coordinate disaster services and plan for future needs. The chapter is designated a regional center because it maintains such a large warehouse of disaster relief supplies. As such, it has forklifts, trucks, disaster relief vehicles, etc. All of these disaster services are delivered at the lowest possible cost, but contributions are still required to maintain the chapter's disaster readiness. Please keep your local chapter of the American Red Cross in mind when considering your benevolent giving.

Local Red Cross Volunteers and Staff Assisted in Cape May Outage

The Jersey Coast Chapter of the American Red Cross in Tinton Falls responded to the massive power outages in southern New Jersey last week by sending personnel and equipment to Cape May County to help. A Red Cross strike team went to equip and man super shelters capable of offering temporary housing for up to a thousand people without heat and electricity. At the same time, Red Cross managers staffed a command post at Tinton Falls, coordinating their strike force's activities by phone and computer on shifts that lasted up to 20 hours a day.

The Press of Atlantic City reported that the Red Cross opened two super shelters, one at the Wildwoods Convention Center in Wildwood, and another at the Woodbine Developmental Center in Woodbine. The super shelters were intended to consolidate the many smaller temporary housing centers then operating. A Red Cross spokesman quoted by Shore News Today said that Red Cross chapters in six counties were on the scene helping out.

Understanding Preschool Expansion

The Fall 2009 issue of Common Ground includes the following article on the state-mandated expansion of preschool for low-income children in New Jersey. It will provide you with some important background information that should help you understand the Matawan Aberdeen School Board's recent decision, described in The Independent, not to renew the lease of the Bayshore Jointure Commission's Developmental Learning Center at 1 Crest Way. (As an aside, better facilities are fine but a weak reason for this Bayshore organization to move to Tinton Falls, completely outside of its service area. No doubt there is more to that particular story.)

Here is the article from Common Ground, mentioned above, writtten by Cynthia Rice and Kathleen Priestly of the Association for Children of New Jersey (ACNJ):

In January 2008, Governor Corzine signed into law a new state school funding formula that included a significant expansion of high quality, state-funded preschool for low-income children. Modeled after the nationally recognized Abbott Preschool Program, currently providing over 40,000 three- and four- year-olds living in New Jersey’s lowest income school districts access to high quality preschool, this expansion represents an opportunity for an additional 30,000 preschoolers to participate in a program that is proving to make a difference in the educational lives of young children.


A portion of the new preschoolers to benefit from the preschool expansion are low-income children classified as preschool disabled. When fully implemented in 2013-2014, school districts will be able to provide preschool disabled children with increased access to inclusive preschool settings.


Districts with a high concentration of poor families will be required to offer a preschool program to all three- and four-year-olds. Districts with fewer low-income families will be required to offer the program only to those children whose families meet income eligibility requirements.


The preschool expansion initiative will not affect eligibility for preschool disabled services. As is now the case, children with disabilities who are eligible for special education will receive services regardless of family income.


Whether preschool disabled or typicallydeveloping, all eligible children will have access to a full, six-hour day, five-day-a-week program, implemented by each school district and fully funded by the state. The program will affect preschool disabled children in two important ways:


First, it will provide them with a guarantee of additional hours of instruction above the current minimum described in state and federal law, and as dictated by the children’s IEPs. Second, because of the size of the expansion, additional classrooms will be required in order to provide program access to eligible children. This means that school districts will have new opportunities to provide integrated classrooms for preschoolers with disabilities. There are various models of inclusion that districts may find appropriate for their preschool population.


Depending on the model of inclusion, the expansion will include the quality components that have been part of the Abbott program, including a class size of no more than 15 children, a teacher with a bachelor’s degree trained to teach young children, a teacher’s aide, family workers and/or social workers to help families, and a research-based curriculum.


Every district will have a different approach to making sure there is adequate classroom space. Districts can offer their program in a variety of ways, including in-district classrooms, classrooms located in licensed child care centers, classrooms located in Head Start centers, or in a combination of these locations. This “mixed delivery system” has been very successful in the Abbott districts, where 65% of the three- and four-year-olds attend preschool in licensed child care and Head Start classrooms. Many preschool disabled children in Abbott districts attend inclusive settings in their community.


School districts are required to establish a preschool-through-third-grade Early Childhood Advisory Council to review preschool program implementation and to support transition as children move from preschool through grade three. While implementing a high quality program will have positive effects on participating children, preschool services must be planned with an eye toward future learning experiences. Coordinated programs that link preschool with the early elementary years and special education are crucial to obtaining positive outcomes for children. Districts’ early childhood advisory councils will be set-up to think globally in order to maximize program impact during the childrens’ early learning years.


What can parents do?


While the preschool expansion initiative is part of the state’s new school funding formula, the FY 2010 state budget included no money for that expansion. School districts may use some of their dollars from the federal stimulus package for preschool, but only a handful will actually do so. School districts need to
hear from parents and other people in the community that preschool expansion is critical to the educational success of students; and that the initiative provides preschoolers with disabilities increased opportunities to attend high quality,
inclusive programs.


Getting Involved

• Learn the status of your district’s Early Childhood Advisory Council and offer to participate.
• Ask your school district about its preschool expansion plan.
• Tell your school board that you support preschool expansion.
• Visit a quality, inclusive preschool classroom.
• Spread the word! Talk to other parents about the expansion.
• Stay informed!  

For further information, check the following websites:

• New Jersey DOE's Division of Early Childhood Education has a FAQ dedicated to questions regarding the program's expansion
• The Association for Children of New Jersey (ACNJ) 
• Statewide Parent Advocacy Network
• Red Bank Green writes on its superintendent, who is seeking to preserve her successful pre-K program when the new Christie administration starts running Trenton.
• The Education Law Center writes on education issues, including early learning, and has published articles such as this piece from August.
  

Red Bank Gets a Dose of MOM's TLC

The classic if neverending political fracas lovingly referred to as MOM -- the Monmouth-Ocean-Middlesex rail line project -- has added yet another grizzly episode to the pantheon of Jersey polemics. The News Transcript says a panel consisting of officials from NJ Transit, NJ Transportation Planning Authority, and each of the three counties involved, drafted a plan that names Red Bank as the lucky junction (at the moment anyway) to connect Lakehurst with New York.

The line to Lakehurst would include intermediate stops along an existing freight line through Shrewsbury, Eatontown, Tinton Falls, Colts Neck, Wall, Howell, Lakewood, Jackson, and Toms River. There would also be a spur from Freehold to Farmingdale. No new stations would have to be built, according to this plan.

Officials in Red Bank and neighboring towns are putting candles in the church tower and drying their powder, watching anxiously for the rascals to dare approach. Freeholder John D'Amico, who says the plan is the best the panel could muster, is reportedly not in good stead with his colleagues in Freehold because they had to first hear about the decision in the media. Marlboro's mayor is throwing Red Bank under the bus, apparently just happy that the panel didn't choose a plan that would ruin his town.

While D'Amico says an announcement is imminent, others say nothing is settled. It's hard to believe the plan could become a reality without broader support at the county level, but they do call it "railroading" after all. The possibility of a Matawan junction is mentioned in the article, but it continues to be one of the lesser options.

I'm sure it is hard to draw a line through such populous counties and find a solution acceptable for all. But no plan is better than a bad plan. I personally like Red Bank and would hate to see its unique cultural atmosphere destroyed through traffic congestion. And I'm sure those in Red Bank don't wish harm to befall Matawan and its neighbors. There must be a better alternative.

News Updates As of 28 May 2009

• Cliffwood Beach man loses firefighter friend to cancer, according to MyCentralJersey.
• Cliffwood Beach man kicked and stomped in Woodbridge, again per MyCentralJersey.
  
• Aberdeen Matawan Regional School District could gain an estimated $160,000 towards energy efficiency if the Green Schools initiative passes the Congress, per the Independent.
• Grounds Keeper Inc, 798 Route 34, Matawan, will offer a seminar on aquatic plants on 30 May 2009 at 11 am, according to the Sentinel.
• Pop Warner tryouts for football and cheerleading will be held at the Matawan Regional High School gym on 20 June 2009 from 9am to noon, per the Asbury Park Press.
• MRHS students received awards at the Annual Spring Luncheon of the Art Society of Monmouth County on 21 May 2009 at Shore Casino on the waterfront in Atlantic Highlands, per the Atlantic Highlands Herald.
• Matawan man charged with drug possession in Sparta, per the Daily Record's Police Blotter.
• Brookdale's softball team came in sixth place in the NJCAA Division III Women's Fastpitch National Championship. Matawan's Danielle Davenport hit .429, according to the News Transcript.
• 27 statewide finalists will compete at Rock'n Music Idol 2009 at the VFW Hall in Cliffwood Beach on 7 June, per MyCentralJersey.
• The Monmouth-Ocean-Middlesex commuter line concept has devolved to a MOM Lite series of proposals that at long last do not include a Matawan option, according to APP. NJ Transit is encouraging the counties to take smaller steps if they want to get anywhere. It doesn't exactly surprise me that NJ Transit sees the public as a bunch of lobsters that need their pot to be heated slowly and steadily.
  
• The mystery meet mentioned in my News Update of 24 May was the Central Jersey, Group 2 meet at Monmouth Regional in Tinton Falls, per NJ.com.
  
  Senior Kyle Robinson amassed 36 points and propelled Matawan to its first sectional title since it won back-to-back titles in 1994-95, as Matawan easily outdistanced nemesis Somerville, 125-60, at the Central Jersey, Group 2 meet at Monmouth Regional in Tinton Falls.
  
  Robinson won the 110 high hurdles in 14.29 and the long jump at 21-11¾. He was runner-up to Dave Brown of Ewing in the 400 hurdles (55.81 to 57.40) and also second in the high jump at 6-0 behind Alex Smith of Rumson at 6-2.
  
  Matawan won three other events. Johnathan Bartlett broke a meet record in the pole vault at 14-7, Derek Garland won the shot put at 48-3½ and Ian Carter the discus at 136-10.
  
  ``The big thing was Kyle staying consistent in the hurdles," coach Sam Turner said. ``Somerville has been a great program and we've been second to them too many times. I'll never forget 2003 when they beat us, 114-113. We had Erison Hurtault, who is now an Olympian, with four wins in that meet and still lost.’’
  
  The Asbury Park Press also covered the event in detail.