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MICROMEDIA PUBLICATIONS, INC.
Vol. 12 - No. 27
Inside This Week’s Edition
THE TOMS RIVER
MES
Your FREE Weekly Hometown Newspaper | Serving All of Toms River Township
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GINNY R HINE By Courtney McCann TOMS RIVER There is a three-way race for the three-year term seat representing Toms River on the regional school board. Current board member James G. Sigurdson
JANET BELL did not file to run for re-election. Ginny Rhine of Grand Avenue, Al Caporaso of Corwill Terrace and Janet Bell of Willow Road are all competing for the seat. Rhine previously served on the Toms River
AL CAPORASO School Board while Bell has experience serving on the Lavalette Board of Education in the 1990s. Caporaso ran for school board in 2015 but (School Board - See Page 5)
Relief Center Suddenly Closes
By Judy Smestad-Nunn OCEAN COUNTY – The Visitation Relief Center, founded in February 2013 to help victims of Superstorm Sandy, closed its doors suddenly this month without notice. In its early days, the center -- which is affiliated with the nearby Visitation Roman Catholic Church on Mantoloking Road in Brick – provided services toward recovery, rebuilding and helping with everyday needs for storm victims. In 2015, the VRC expanded its assistance to the low-income and homeless from Ocean and Monmouth Counties. Representatives of the VRC had no comment on its closure, but at the October 18 council meeting, Brick Mayor John G. Ducey said the center was closed by a construction official from the Trenton Diocese. There were rumors that the town closed it, Ducey said, but it was the diocese
who closed it after its Director of Property and Construction Scott Pirozzi found out the center did not have a Certificate of Occupancy, that there were a number of violations dating back to 2013, and that no inspections had been done there, officials said. In order for the center to be in compliance with the township, an inspection was scheduled for October 26, but Pirozzi had arrived from Trenton and he called the township construction department to cancel the inspection. “He said there was no work that had been done and we’re going to fail all of these, and he felt that it was unsafe, and the archdiocese decided that the best course of action was to close the Visitation Relief Center, so the archdiocese will decide from there, if they want to repair it and reopen it; they own the property,” the mayor said. Pirozzi was concerned about the safety of the tenants, the workers, the volunteers and
the people who came to the VRC for the services, Ducey added. After the meeting, Brick Township Business Administrator Joanne Bergin said the VRC, previously the location of Colony Market and then the Mantoloking Market Place, was rented by the Visitation Church after the storm, and was eventually purchased by the archdiocese. In a timeline provided by Township Construction Official Dan Newman, township staff fi rst met with the VRC in May 2013 to outline the permit requirements and process. With a long history of incomplete applications, unfinished and unapproved renovations and alterations (and therefore no final inspections scheduled), improperly installed mechanical equipment, in October 2013 the township reminded the VRC that they were operating without a CO. During the same month, township staff (Closes - See Page 33)
Business Directory............................27 Classifieds ........................................ 28 Community News ....................... 10-17 Dear Joel .......................................... 24 Dear Pharmacist .............................. 21 Dr. Izzy’s Sound News .................... 20 Fun Page .......................................... 29 Letters to the Editor ............................ 9 WWW.MICROMEDIAPUBS.COM
October 29, 2016
A Voice To Weave Through Sandy’s Labyrinth: Resident Works As Part-Time Ombudsman
By Bob Vosseller TOMS RIVER – Four years ago, township resident Trevor V. Newman was content to be retired. His work background and his sympathetic manner however brought him back to work following Superstorm Sandy as the township’s fi rst storm recovery ombudsman in 2013. “I was in the insurance industry for 40 years and also in construction. It seemed a perfect match to understand the problems that people were having after Superstorm Sandy and getting them back in their homes,” Newman said. The fourth anniversary of Superstorm Sandy is here, remembering a storm which devastated the state’s coastal communities and hit Toms River’s barrier island section of Ortley Beach the hardest. (Resident - See Page 6)
–Photo by Bob Vosseller Trevor V. Newman was hired in 2013 to serve as the township Superstorm Sandy ombudsman, addressing residents’ problems in the wake of the storm.
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