Volume LXXV, Number 50
www.towntopics.com
$17.5M PPS Referendum Coming Up Next Month For Princeton Voters
Progress on Climate Action Plan Strategies . . . . . . . 5 Council Askes For More Info Before Voting on SID . . . 8 HomeFront Welcomes Families to New Housing . .10 McCarter Presents What the Constitution Means to Me . .16 Winter Intensive Features All-Star Faculty . . . . . 17 Barnes Stars Off the Bench As PU Men’s Hoops Tops UMBC . . . . . . . . . . . . .25 Following in Brother’s Footsteps, Garlock Excelling For PHS Boys’ Hockey . . 31
Getting to Know Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021) . . 15 Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Berkshire Hathaway Fox & Roach Realtors . . 20-21 Books . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Calendar . . . . . . . . . . 22 Classified Ads . . . . . . 36 Mailbox . . . . . . . . . . . 13 New To Us . . . . . . . . . 24 Obituaries . . . . . . . . . 34 Performing Arts . . . . . 17 Police Blotter . . . . . . . 11 Real Estate . . . . . . . . 36 Sports . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 Topics of the Town . . . . 5 Town Talk . . . . . . . . . . 6
Most Princeton voters will be going to the polls in person for a special school election on January 25, but some voteby-mail ballots are already arriving in mailboxes this week. Voters will be weighing in on a $17.5 million bond issue to finance new roofing and other repairs and improvements for all six schools in the Princeton Public Schools (PPS) district. The district has invited families to join PPS Business Administrator Matt Bouldin and Board of Education (BOE) members on Wednesday, December 15 at 7 p.m. on Zoom for an information and Q&A session about this facilities stewardship referendum. (For more information and the webinar link visit princetonk12.org/ district/referendum-2022.) At several recent public sessions, and on the PPS website, the BOE, highlighting stewardship and fiscal responsibility, has presented extensive information on the needed repairs, the costs, and the impact on Princeton taxes. “Providing a safe and healthy environment where our students can learn has consistently been a top priority in this community,” said Bouldin in a December 13 press release. “After a comprehensive review of building systems, the Board of Education is proposing a practical way to make repairs and improvements.” In a press conference on December 13, BOE President Beth Behrend encouraged people to inform themselves and to vote on January 25. Effective communication and responsible stewardship have been the Board’s priorities, she added. “We’re very much interested in making sure that the community understands the thinking behind this,” she said. “We’ve been elected by the community to be stewards and fiduciaries for these buildings, for the whole system. We’d love to be just focusing on our children and what they’re learning, but we do have to focus on more mundane matters, and we’re trying to be good stewards.” She continued, “We want to make sure that the community understands the data that we have collected and how we thought about this and why the timing is what it is.” Behrend noted that it is not typical to conduct a referendum in January, but the timing depended on the completion of an extensive review of PPS facilities Continued on Page 7
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Wednesday, December 15, 2021
Health Dept. Leads Battle Against COVID Wednesday, December 15 has been proclaimed “Boost NJ Day,” celebrating the one-year anniversary of the first COVID-19 vaccinations in New Jersey, but the news on the current state of the pandemic is mixed and the outlook going forward remains uncertain. The Omicron variant continues to spread rapidly across the globe, but it’s still the Delta variant that assaults New Jersey, as cases and hospitalizations have been on the rise over the past three weeks. State health officials continue to urge unvaccinated residents to get the vaccine, and the vaccinated to get booster shots if they haven’t already. Only about 36 percent of New Jersey’s eligible residents have received a booster according to the New Jersey Department of Health (NJDOH), but 44 percent of Princeton’s residents age 18 and over have booster coverage. The Princeton Health Department on Monday, December 13 reported 33 new COVID-19 cases in the previous seven days, 57 new cases in the previous 14 days — close to the highest weekly and bi-weekly totals of the pandemic. Princeton University reported 34 new cases out of 18,934 tests in the week of December 4-10, for a positivity rate of
.18 percent and a continuing “moderate to high” campus risk. The Princeton Public Schools (PPS) reported 11 new COVID-19 cases for the week ending December 10, including eight students and three staff members. That was the highest weekly total recorded in the PPS this school year. Princeton Deputy Administrator for Health and Community Services Jeff Grosser expressed a mix of frustration and optimism in the battle that he and his
department have been waging against COVID-19 over the past almost two years. He described frustration in assessing the current surge “after everything we have been through, the ups and downs of the pandemic,” but optimism in considering the high vaccination rates and the increasing numbers of booster doses. “We all need to keep in perspective how drastic this recent surge would be without widespread access to vaccines and boosters,” he said. “As we continue to Continued on Page 11
NJ Transit Still Seeking Public Input On Future of Dinky Transitway
There is still time to weigh in on NJ Transit’s recently announced alternatives for upgraded transit along the Princeton “Dinky” railway corridor. According to a spokesperson for the agency, members of the public have until December 29 to take a survey on the four different options, which were issued early this month on the NJ Transit project website. One alternative for the future of the corridor, which runs between Princeton Junction and Princeton, keeps the existing trains, which date from the 1970s. Another alternative would use bus rapid transit, a bus-based system designed to
have better capacity and reliability than a conventional system. Another two alternatives would replace the existing trains with a combination of bus rapid transit and light rail. The options have been developed as part of NJ Transit’s Princeton Transitway Study, which “will evaluate existing conditions and estimate future demand, considering planned developments, as well as how new and emerging transportation technologies and other trends are changing how and when people travel,” according to the agency’s website. Continued on Page 9
VISIT WITH SANTA: Santa Claus was on hand to hear the wishes of children of all ages last Sunday during Terhune Orchards’ Holiday Season Kickoff Weekend. Attendees share their favorite part of the holiday season in this week’s Town Talk on page 6. (Photo by Charles R. Plohn)
