School Reports, Contentious BOE Meeting, Memorial Day In Local News

People showed up at the Fort Lee High School library Tuesday thinking they would have a chance to address their concerns to Interim Superintendent Steven Engravalle, but school board president Arthur Levine said Engravalled had a serious family medical emergency and couldn't make it to the meeting.

While about 200 Fort Lee residents of all ages waved American flags and fought back the heat in front of the Fort Lee Cairola Barber Veterans of Foreign War (VFW) Post 2342 building on Center Avenue Monday, one absence did not go unnoticed, that of VFW Commander Jimmy Viola.

Interim superintendent Steven Engravalle said that while he’s proud of the district’s students, the numbers contained in the annual school report cards released by the state Department of Education (DOE) Thursday can be deceiving, and that he’s focused on remedying the district-wide “achievement gap” in three specific areas.

Police originally received a call of a fight between co-workers at a gas station on Anderson Avenue. Seven police officers responded and determined that it wasn’t much of a fight, charging one of the men with assault after he allegedly attacked his co-worker with a golf club.

The agency is installing fencing with locked gates and “keeping a closer eye” on the area with no public walkway but where a woman was found early last Saturday stuck in a grate, as the investigation into how she got there continued.

A 37-year-old convicted robber from Teaneck was indicted Thursday on charges that he broke into two homes on Hanover Street in Teaneck in January. The man was out on bail for burglaries in Fort Lee when police arrested him for the two Teaneck burglaries.

Two people were injured on the New Jersey Turnpike in Fort Lee Wednesday morning, when a tractor-trailer lost a tire, which then bounced across the center divider and hit two oncoming vehicles.

The Fort Lee Film Commission sponsored a trip Tuesday evening to the Circle in the Square Theatre on Broadway, where a lucky group of Fort Lee High School drama students got to take in the musical “Godspell.” The trip to see the Broadway musical was the Fort Lee Film Commission’s way of thanking the high school cast and crew of the recent production of "Mack & Mabel" and included a Q&A session with the actors.

Police say the two pedestrians were crossing in the crosswalk near Monument Park on Palisade Avenue when they were struck by a car making a left turn in broad daylight. The driver was charged.

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

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