Officials to Take Closer Look at Traffic Impact of Development, Municipal Budget Introduced

Borough officials said Monday that both Redevelopment Area 5 developers, along with the borough’s traffic consultant, need to work out a comprehensive study before the full impact on local traffic of development at the long-vacant, 16-acre area in the shadows of the George Washington Bridge is known.

That after a traffic consultant for Fort Lee Redevelopment Associates (FLRA) backed off his initial projections of how much traffic would increase, saying they may have been as much as 20 percent “overstated.”

Consultant Kenneth Mackiewicz based his revised projections on a survey at Mediterranean North and South, which some residents and board members said was not a good comparison to the two 47-story residential towers FLRA has proposed for the East parcel of Redevelopment Area 5. (Full Story)

****

The Fort Lee Borough Council introduced its 2012 municipal budget Thursday, with spending up 1.9 percent, and a tax levy increase of 1.86 percent over last year’s budget.

The total amount of money borough officials anticipate raising through taxation is roughly $58.7 million, and the total anticipated general appropriations for 2012 at introduction amount to slightly less than $69.4 million under the proposed budget. (Full Story)

****

The office in Fort Lee held a ribbon cutting ceremony at its new office in the CNBC Building on Fletcher Avenue Tuesday morning, where Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich and other local dignitaries officially “welcomed” the company—a company that never actually left, at least not for the past seven years—to the borough.

But certified financial planner and manager of the Fort Lee MetLife office Paul Lee said that when the company’s lease at Parker Plaza expired, they had a chance to leave; they just decided not to. (Full Story)

****

Students at earned about $800 for their school’s PTA this year simply by clipping coupons and, with the help of family members, shopping online.

Organized by first-time volunteer Stefanie Stuart, the parent of a first-grader at School No. 1, the school participated in the Box Tops for Education program once again.

The organization provides cash to schools based on the number of “Box Tops” coupons clipped from “hundreds of participating products” or from shopping online. (Full Story)

****

An art and literary magazine produced each year at Lewis F. Cole Middle School, Intermedia, was recently as one of the top publications of its kind in the country by Columbia University’s Columbia Scholastic Press Association (CSPA), according to middle school art teacher Nina Anderson, one of the school’s Intermedia advisors. (Full Story)

****

All of the head coaches of ’s winter sports teams had the opportunity to honor their senior players Wednesday at the high school auditorium, where the FLHS Athletic Booster Club hosted a Senior Appreciation Night for winter student-athletes.

Bowling coach Dennis Sayer, cheerleading coach Nina Anderson, wrestling coach Alex Almeyda, boys basketball coach John Ziemba, girls basketball coach Stacie Zafiris and indoor track coach Ed Garrison took turns not only talking about their respective teams and seasons, but also about each individual senior athlete who helped lead them, with some of the coaches choking back tears in the process. (Full Story)

****

Fort Lee’s Congregation Gesher Shalom celebrated Purim Wednesday with the reading of the Megillat Esther, or the Scroll of Esther. (Full Story)

****

And the heyday of moviemaking and the female trailblazers who put Fort Lee on the map were on full display last Friday night at the Fort Lee Museum’s centennial celebration, “Reel Jersey Girls: The Women Filmmakers of Fort Lee.” (Full Story)

****

The Week in Review appears every Sunday on Fort Lee Patch.