Fort Lee Kicks Off Holidays This Week, BOE to Hold Private Session

By the end of the week, there will be no doubt, as you travel around Fort Lee that the holiday season is here.

Fort Lee’s annual holiday tree lighting event at the Fort Lee Community Center will take place on Thursday, Dec. 6 at 7 p.m.

Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich has promised that this year’s festivities kicking off the holiday season locally will be “extra-special” for children in the borough who have had their last two Halloweens disrupted—or as was the case in 2012, outright cancelled—because of unexpectedly severe weather events like Sandy and a very early snowstorm.

Then on Saturday, Dec. 8 at 6 p.m. the first night of Hanukkah, Congregation Gesher Shalom will host Fort Lee’s annual community Menorah lighting at the “triangle”—Lemoine Avenue, Main Street and Schlosser Street—followed by a celebration at the Synagogue.

The Menorah lighting is open to all, as is the program that follows immediately afterward at Gesher Shalom with “food and festivities,” according to Rabbi Kenneth Stern.

Also this week, for those who are interested, the Fort Lee Board of Education will hold a special work session Monday to “discuss a personnel matter,” but the meeting is going to be held in private, according to school officials.

The meeting at 7 p.m. at the school district’s central office Board Conference Room on the sixth floor of 2175 Lemoine Ave., but an immediate motion for private session is expected, and the board will take no action in public or private, school officials said.

In addition, the Fort Lee Mayor and Council executive session originally scheduled for Dec. 13 will instead take place this Wednesday, Dec. 5 with a public hearing set to start at about 8 p.m., according to borough officials.

The public hearing, which will take place in Borough Hall’s second-floor conference room, is on the following ordinance:

Ord. #2012-43—Bond Ordinance for Financing for the Acquisition of Land at 183 Main Street, Block 4851, Lot 5 – Settlement of a Civil Action Entitled 183 Main Street Realty Associates, LLC vs. Borough of Fort Lee - $2,050,000

A complete agenda for the meeting will be available at the Fort Lee Borough Clerk’s Office on Tuesday by 1 p.m. and on the borough’s website.

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