By JOHN T. WARD

Mark Lockwood spent the night on his boat at the Shrewsbury River Yacht Club in Fair Haven Friday, and woke to the sight of a Navesink River gone brown. The worst kind of brown, he thought.

Though it didn’t smell, it appeared to be human waste, he said.

“It was disgusting,” he told a Fair Haven police officer who’d come to the club to investigate Saturday evening. “I’ve never seen anything like it, and I’ve been on this river all my life.”

Ben Hamilton, whose home abuts the club property, said he had never seen anything like it, either.

But whatever they saw, it wasn’t from the town’s sanitary sewer, said an official with the regional sewerage authority that serves the borough. And it may have been pollen.

“We can guarantee that the Two Rivers Water Reclamation Authority pipe isn’t leaking,” TRWRA commissioner and yacht club member Bill Baarck told redbankgreen Saturday night, referring to a waste pipe that runs just beneath the Navesink River shore from Gillespie Avenue east to the yacht club, where it meets a pumping station.

“But we can’t guarantee that tides and winds haven’t brought in pollutants from elsewhere, over which we have no control,” he said.

Though he said he had not seen the brown tide himself, other recent reports of human waste — one on the Metedeconk River, and one at a location he could not immediately recall —  turned out to be vast collections of dead pollen on the water, Baarck said.

An authority inspector investigated the Navesink report and found no sign of leakage along the beach, either from the buried pipeline or the several manhole-topped access holes along its length, he said.

The entire stretch of pipe, which is about 40 years old, is scheduled to be replaced soon, with heavy construction equipment slated for delivery to the beach via the yacht club’s ramp as early as Monday. Baarck said the work is preventative.

Mayor Ben Lucarelli tells redbankgreen that a recent video inspection of the pipe found river water infiltrating the system at the foot of Gillespie Avenue, but that no sewage was getting into the river.

“It’s in weak condition,” Baarck said, and was one reason the authority sought and obtained state Department of Environmental Protection permits to replace the piping with a new system.

The new pipes will be laid next the existing pipes and, when completed, a cut-over from old system will be scheduled for the middle of the night to prevent any waste from getting into the river, he said.

Lockwood and Hamilton said the brown stuff appeared to have come from the west, based on Saturday’s winds. Baarck said that while the authority ruled out the Fair Haven system as its source, he could not rule out the possibility that it had come from the Red Bank system.

Lockwood and other club members said they sometimes see post-storm waste from the Middletown side of the river, where mansions along Navesink River Road are not hooked into a sewer and rely instead on septic tanks. But Saturday’s brown blob was far larger, they told redbankgreen.

Red Bank’s property tax won’t rise as much as expected this year.

Councilman Mike DuPont, chair of the council’s finance committee, says a penny has been trimmed from the increase anticipated as recently as two weeks ago.

That means the owner of a residential property assessed at the borough-average $401,000 will pay 1.4 cents more per $100 of value than last year, or a full-year increase of $56.50, DuPont said following the formal introduction of the $20.8 million spending plan Wednesday night.

The budget, which calls for raising $12 million from borough property owners, is $209,000 lighter than expected last month, said Chief Financial Officer Colleen Lapp. The biggest individual component of the drop came on an audit of payments for health insurance, which yielded $32,000 after some borough employees were found to have been billed for the wrong plans and other clerical errors.

A line item for arborist’s services was reduced from $27,000 to $5,000 after more funding became available under a shared services agreement with neighboring towns, she said. Red Bank will now hire an arborist on an as-needed hourly basis, DuPont said.

A public hearing and final vote on the budget are scheduled for May 23.

Meantime, DuPont said borough officials are still receiving and reviewing private-sector proposals to take over the town’s health insurance plan. A 22-percent increase in costs handed down earlier this year by the multi-town Health Insurance Fund, which Red Bank helped found, has officials considering a departure from the plan, DuPont said.

By MARY ANN BOURBEAU

Looking to form a pickup hoops or softball game, but don’t have enough friends? Try Joinagame, a new social network for pickup sports based right here on the Green.

Launching today, Joinagame was built by Corey Wagner of Rumson and Patrick Finan of Fair Haven to handle all the pesky details, such as finding and reserving an available field or court.

But it also addresses a bigger hurdle: not knowing enough people who might be game for a game.

“Once you leave college, you lose your sports network,” said Wagner.

Wagner and Finan work with the recreation directors in Fair Haven, Little Silver, Red Bank, Rumson, Sea Bright and Shrewsbury, as well as Atlantic Highlands and Oceanport, to monitor availability of facilities. Once a person registers at Joinagame, he or she can sign up to play a game already formed online or start their own.

Sports offered are basketball, flag football, kickball, soccer, softball, tennis, Ultimate Frisbee and volleyball.

Joinagame is free, though some towns offer players the option of reserving a field for $40, which all the players would split via online payments. Joinagame takes care of all the paperwork, insurance and payments, making it a win-win for the players and the municipalities. The site will soon offer referees for hire, too.

“It’s free to register and we hope to keep it that way, covering our costs with advertising from sports merchandise stores or bars,” said Wagner.

Finan, 22, earned a finance degree from Providence College in Rhode Island, where he played intramural tennis, soccer, hockey and softball.

“Sports are a huge passion of mine,” he said.

But Joinagame isn’t just for the freshly minted grads. “I’ve seen a lot of parents who bring their kids to practice and say they miss being out there themselves,” he said.

Wagner, a 25-year-old construction worker, and Finan, who is currently waiting tables, met four years ago when Wagner began dating Finan’s sister Jennifer. They’ve spent the last five months creating the site.

Wagner says Joinagame works as well for avid players as it does for those who can only squeeze in a game or two a season.

“A pickup game is nice, because you can show up once,” he said. “You don’t have to commit to a league, and if you don’t mesh with the guys, you can get a whole different group next time.”

The key challenge to their roll-out, they said, is getting enough players on board from the outset so that games have enough players to commence. They spent a full day last week putting up fliers in area coffee shops, salons and other high-traffic businesses, and were pleased to find a lot of interest.

“I was surprised how quickly people picked up on the concept,” said Wagner. “We’re starting local to see how it goes, but we would like to do it for every town in the area.”

By JOHN T. WARD

Kathie Panepinto was leading a tour of the Red Bank Primary School property and lamenting the heavy growth that hides an adjoining pond Monday when groundhog that had been sunning itself in the grass scooted across her path and into the brush.

“Oh, look at that,” she said said excitedly, noting that up-close sightings of deer and other wildlife are common at the school, which sits on landfill in a former wetlands abutting the Swimming River.

It was the kind of moment that for decades has inspired talk of the school’s potential as natural sciences learning center. And it underscored the value of ongoing efforts by Panepinto and other volunteers in their most ambitious effort to date: creating a permanent physical link between the school and the inaccessible pond.

A concept plan shows a walkway out into the pond that the foundation hopes to win funding for. (Click to enlarge)

Since its revival from dormancy four years ago, the nonprofit Red Bank Borough Education Foundation has focused its efforts on small-bore projects: leading cleanups of the 17-acre primary school property, lending a hand and a few dollars to installations such as a butterfly garden, a small greenhouse and a human sundial clock.

Now, though, the all-volunteer group is raising its sights with a proposal to build an outdoor classroom in the form of a pier and observation deck on the pond. The structure would enable students at the K-3 school to see land and aquatic habitats up close, and “to do wet and muddy samplings,” said RBBEF member and Councilman Ed Zipprich.

“Most folks don’t even know there’s a pond back there,” said member Susan Berke.

“The idea is to make access to the pond not just for science, but for reading, writing, art,” said Panepinto, an RBBEF officer.

No cost estimate for the project has yet been worked up, and foundation members don’t even know if they would need and might obtain permits from the state Department of Environmental Protection for the structure, which may be subject to limitations on building in coastal areas.

Still, they’ve begun the process of trying to win a grant for as much as $460,000 from the National Science Foundation, said foundation president Doug Winning, an architect. “We’re going for the full enchilada,” he said.

Meantime, the organization has raised about $10,000 in each of the past two years through art auctions held at the Atrium at Navesink Harbor. This year, no such event is planned, though members hope to put together an Antiques Roadshow-type event for 2013.

Meantime, the group has produced a reusable canvas shopping tote featuring Red Bank student art that will soon be available around town for $5. For $10, residents get the tote and membership in the RBBEF.

“We’re still taking baby steps at this point, but we’ve got momentum going, and that’s the important thing,” said Zipprich.

In an unwritten opinion, Judge Anthony Mellaci ruled from the bench in Freehold Friday that a municipal court judge had given “misplaced” credibility to the accusers of firefighter Justin Hughes, said Hughes’s attorney, Scott Servilla.

Hughes, 29, was found guilty of harassment for provocative statements, which he denied making, that 25-year-old Steven Lang, a former Marine, “should have died in Iraq.”

The alleged insults, in the Sea Bright firehouse bar during a wetdown ceremony for a new truck, were said to have incited attacks on Hughes by Lang and his brother, Peter Lang, 33. The scuffles, in which Hughes claimed he was injured, were captured on closed-circuit security video.

Lang and his brother were both convicted by Little Silver municipal court judge James Berube of assaulting Hughes.

All three came away with the same sentence: $500 in penalties, as well as a requirement to perform 100 hours of community service.

But Servilla, himself a Sea Bright fireman for 28 years, said Mellaci found that “there was insufficient proof to find that Justin had even made those statements.”

Asked to comment, Servilla said the ruling “speaks for itself. It was always clear to several people that Justin didn’t make any such statements.”

He declined to comment further, except to say that the events of October 9, 2010, were not representative of the character of the volunteer fire squad, which “has moved on in a positive direction” under the leadership of Chief Chad Murphy.

Hughes told redbankgreen that Mellaci’s ruling left him with “a smile on my face that couldn’t be any wider.”

It was unclear late Friday if the Langs had also appealed their convictions. William Wilson, the lawyer who represented the Langs, could not be reached for comment.

All three firefighters were expected to face disciplinary action by the borough council for violating employee policy. Hughes said he will now seek to have that action against him terminated based on Mellaci’s ruling.

By JOHN T. WARD

Red Bank officials told proponents of a community garden Wednesday that they need to satisfy the concerns of two adjoining neighbors before they can get an all-clear to farm a borough-owned lot on Marion Street.

“If you really want a community garden, I suggest you go speak to” a next-door neighbor who recently expressed concerns about home security and basement flooding, Councilwoman Kathy Horgan told lead garden advocate Cindy Burnham at the council’s bimonthly meeting.

“Maybe you can change her mind and we can get down to basics,” including the provision of water to the site, Horgan said.

“We don’t want to cram this down anyone’s throat,” said Councilwoman Juanita Lewis.

Where the garden would get water was a sticking point at the last council meeting, when public utilities director Gary Watson was asked to look into the cost of connecting to the water main under the street.

Watson tells redbankgreen he reported his recommendation back to the council, but declined to say what that recommendation was, and the details did not come up Wednesday night.

Still, town officials said the garden could go ahead, provided the concerns of the neighbors were addressed.

The owner of a second adjoining property has asked that there be a 10-foot buffer of unplanted ground along the shared property line.

Burnham said that a buffer on each side would only leave five feet for planting on a lot that she said is just 25 feet wide. Councilman Art Murphy said the lot is at least 40 feet wide.

Property records describe the lot as 50 feet wide by 120 feet deep.

Borough Administrator Stanley Sickels said he would communicate with the two neighbors, but “we probably need your help to sell it” to the neighbor who is concerned about the hours at which the gardeners will gather and who will be there, he told Burnham.

The site is the location of a disused water pumping station enclosed in a shed that the town uses to store materials used in cleanups of oil and other spills, Watson said.

It doesn’t look very red now, but the outlook for fans of Red Bank’s red clay courts is rosy. (Click to enlarge)

By DANIELLE TEPPER

A recent visit to Red Bank’s clay tennis courts in Marine Park found the riverfront facility deserted and unusually quiet. The courts, cracked and faded, looked more like a stretch of beige sand than a popular spot for athletes to brush up on their skills.

Not to worry though, for this is an annual lull. Over the next month or so, the only player working these courts will be court manager Rich Nicoletti, who’s been tending the facility, and its patrons, for decades.

“What you’re looking at here is the wear-and-tear of winter,” says Nicoletti. And its his job to bring the playing surface back to dusty-red glory, he said.

Each spring, the courts are stripped down to their bottom layer as Nicoletti and a team work their magic to revive one of America’s tennis rarities.

“It’s a long process,” Nicoletti said. “Repairing the damage, smoothing it out, laying the clay and the slate, nailing the lines.”

You read correctly: the court boundaries aren’t merely sprayed on. Long strips  of fabric are cut and, one by one, nailed to the court by hand.

It sounds like an arduous task, but the wait shouldn’t be too long.

“By mid-May, we hope to be just about finished,” said Nicoletti. “Then you can come back here and have your tennis match on our beautiful red clay.”

The courts are open to the public from May 26 to mid-October, seven days a week, from 7 a.m. to sundown. But they’re not free: court usage costs $28 per hour, though members get unlimited use. See the facility website for a schedule of fees for borough residents and non-residents.

For more information on the courts or lessons with “Coach Rich,” call (732) 530-2737 or email.

You can also check out redbankgreen’s 2007 article on the courts here.

Closing in on a celebration of its centennial, Fair Haven is having some trouble tracking historical time capsules, the Asbury Park Press reported Wednesday.

With food, fireworks, music and other details of the June 16 public celebration squared away, borough officials are trying to determine whether to assemble a time capsule for posterity, and wondering past time capsules are accounted for, the Press reports.

From reporter Larry Higgs’ account, referring to “other time capsules buried in the borough 36 years ago, during the nation’s bicentennial in 1976:”

“We’re not certain what the status of time capsules in Fair Haven are,” said Theresa Casagrande, borough administrator, after Monday’s council meeting. “We’re looking to dig up some historical knowledge, and see how many are buried and whether it is appropriate to open them.”

Officials haven’t decided if a time capsule will be buried for the borough’s centennial this year, filled with artifacts depicting life in the borough in 2012, she said.

“I know we did find a time capsule in the cellar of borough hall that was never planted as part of the school project (in 1976) and returned it to the school,” Casagrande said. “(Historian) Pat Drummond seemed to recall there was a time capsule at Bicentennial Hall as part of that celebration.”

That time capsule remained unopened until it was returned to the superintendent of schools, she said.

“There was one in 1976 … buried across the street somewhere in Memorial Park,” said Mayor Benjamin Lucarelli. “The question is, is it time to open it, or time to put down another time capsule?”

Casagrande said officials have to determine if that is a different time capsule or the school time capsule found when the basement of borough hall was being cleaned out.

There may be one more problem. The instructions for opening one of the time capsules may be inside the time capsule, he said.

By JOHN T. WARD

Red Bank’s streets are about to be abloom in yellow, and not solely from the spring return of the forsythia.

The town is giving away more than 2,200 bright yellow recycling bins to borough residents in an effort to create some identifiable uniformity to the re-use effort.

Town officials began giving the 20-gallon, lidded barrels out to senior citizen residents several weeks ago, and have now widened the availability to all residents, Maria Rotolo of the public utilities office tells redbankgreen.

To obtain one, residents have to call the department at 732-530-2773 or visit the office, on Chestnut Street opposite the armory ice rink. Residents have the option of picking up the barrels or having them delivered. The town will also remove any old containers that residents had been using for recycling, Rotolo said.

The barrels come at no direct cost to residents. A $17,925 grant from the Monmouth County Solid Waste Advisory Council covered the cost of the first 1,500 barrels, and the public utilities department pulled $8,800 from its budget to pay for an additional 726, said director Gary Watson.

While the total 2,226 barrels is fewer than the 3,000 single-family households in town, “not everybody wants one,” Rotolo said. “We’ve had people tell us they don’t want one, for whatever reason.”

Red Bank uses single-stream collection of recyclables, in which paper, plastic, glass and aluminum is picked up together and sorted afterward. Here’s some info on that: Red Bank Single Stream