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.”

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

A 19-year-old Fair Haven woman home from college for Easter weekend died as a result of a pre-dawn accident on Harding Road in Little Silver last Friday, police said Monday.

Jillian Dinger, of Spruce Drive, died at Jersey Shore Medical Center in Neptune eight hours after being struck by a car driven by another Fair Haven resident at about 3:15 a.m., said police Chief Dan Shaffery.

Authorities are still piecing together the circumstances under which Dinger, a 2011 graduate of Rumson-Fair Haven Regional High, was found alone and severely injured near the center line of the road, opposite the entrance to the Alderbrook condo community, he said.

Shaffery said Dinger was struck by a 2007 Nissan Altima driven by Robert Post, 53, who called in the accident to police.

On arrival, police found Dinger lying just to the south of the road’s center line, which serves as the Fair Haven-Little Silver border.

Post’s vehicle had sustained damage to the front end on the driver’s side, Shaffery said.

The victim was wearing “all-dark clothing,” he said. No charges have been filed against Post, “and none are expected to be filed against him,” Shaffery said.

Dinger was medevaced by a helicopter that landed at nearby Red Bank Regional High and taken to the hospital, where she died at 11:14 a.m. Shaffery said.

Borough police and a team from the Monmouth County Serious Collision Analysis Response Team (SCART) are investigating, and are retracing Dinger’s steps and communications to determine as fully as possible her state of mind and destination at the time she was hit, Shaffery said.

Police have determined that she was last visiting a home on nearby Prospect Avenue in Little Silver, Shaffery said. The results of a toxicology test will not be available for two-to-four weeks, he said.

Dinger was a freshman at the State University of New York at Albany, where she was majoring in psychology, according to her obituary, which appeared Sunday in the Asbury Park Press. Shaffery said she had come home for the Easter weekend.

Dinger had worked at the Sands Beach Club in Sea Bright, according to her obituary.

A roadside memorial of lillies, balloons and candies was erected Sunday at the scene of the accident.

The wall-embedded outboard motor shown in last week’s Where got some beanie propellers turning.

Two readers guessed Irwin Marine in Red Bank, but all others who wrote in had it right.

Correct answer: Angler’s Marina in Sea Bright. Or, as Scott Breslow and Jake Rue each put it, in response to our cheeky request for its coordinates:

Latitude N 40° 21′ 20″
Longitude W 73° 58′ 31″

In addition to Scott and Jake, we heard from Brian Phillips, Sean Cahill, Parker Trasborg, the Colmorgen Kids, Michael McMahon, Mark Rubin, John Larney, Scott Howard, Wade Davis, Lindsey Hintelmann, John Gibson, Jeff Snyder, Cliff Antell, Jeff Dalton, Sandra Talarico and Craig Widmaier, and we thank all for writing in.

If you recognize this week’s image, please drop us a line.

By STACIE FANELLI

Sixty years old, the Rumson-Sea Bright Bridge over the Shrewsbury River is rapidly corroding, inadequate for today’s traffic loads and behind the times on accident safety. Its electrical system is the same one installed in 1952. It’s not up to snuff in terms of earthquake resistance, either.

In a word, Monmouth County engineering officials say, the bridge’s condition is “serious.”

Whether to spend an estimated $10 million to rehabilitate the bridge or some $50 million to replace it was the core question at a pair of public hearings held Monday in Sea Bright and Rumson. More than a dozen county officials and consultants were present at each to kick off a series of discussions aimed, they said, at “building consensus” on a solution.

But some residents of the two towns voiced skepticism that their concerns – which include the impacts of a new span on property values on the Rumson side and on the business district in Sea Bright – would be given much weight in the process.

“They seem to have it in mind to build a new bridge, and I just don’t want it destroying the neighborhood in the process,” said Tom Calvanico, who lives near the Rumson anchorage.

The bridge, designated S-32, was the focus of an open-house style meeting in Rumson Monday night, as well as at a separate meeting in Sea Bright earlier in the day. Thirteen members of the project team were on hand to answer questions about traffic, design, engineering and the environmental impact of several courses of action.

On the table are replacing the low drawbridge or building a high fixed bridge, which would mean road realignment and a possible loss of private property, officials acknowledged.

“Doing nothing is not an option. At some point, something has to be done,” Martine Culbertson, a community involvement facilitator hired by the county, told the Rumson audience.

But as in Sea Bright earlier, the Rumson Q&A session elicited concern over whether the community’s voices would actually matter in the final decision of the preferred alternative that will be presented to the federal government.

“This just reminds me of Sandy Hook,” said Rumson resident Phil Wagner, referring to the replacement of the Route 36 Highlands Bridge with the new Joe Azzolina Bridge. “Everybody was listened to and all of a sudden, hocus pocus, a decision was made.”

Jon Moren, the county’s principal engineer for bridges, repeatedly assured the audiences that no decision has been made regarding any aspect of the bridge’s construction, including whether construction will ever occur. And team members stressed that in order for the project to qualify for federal funding, Uncle Sam requires them to weigh all options. He encouraged residents to comment in writing with their objections to a fixed bridge.

While a drawbridge would allow for the structure to stay where it is, an issue of funding concerned the crowd. Glen Schetelich, project manager from the engineering firm Hardesty and Hanover, refuted the rumor that the federal government is not interested in funding movable bridges because of maintenance.

“It’s project by project,” he said. “I’ve worked on drawbridges that were replaced with drawbridges.”

The estimate is $10 million to repair only what has been damaged up until now. That does not include preventative construction or replacement, which could come with a budget of over $50 million, said Moren, who added that the county typically spends only $10 million per year on bridges altogether.

All funding is expected to come from the federal government, through the North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority, but only if the project team follows the procedures outlined by the National Environmental Policy Administration (NEPA), which include holding Monday’s public informational meetings.

The meeting “is one of the early litmus tests the Federal Highway Administration will take a look at,” Culbertson told the Rumson crowd.

A traffic survey will be conducted during the summer, the peak of bridge use, to address concerns about congestion.

Moren, who is also the project manager of the Oceanic Bridge project, said construction would not happen on both bridges at once. He confirmed that the current closure of the Oceanic is on schedule to end before next Memorial Day, which is when only the first phase of the Rumson-Sea Bright bridge would be completed.

If Rumson, Sea Bright and the county cannot reach a consensus, though, the team will have to go off course from the schedule put in place by NEPA and will lose its federal funding. The first phase of planning, “local concept development” is 18 months long and should end by April 2013. If everyone agrees on the type of bridge to build and how to do it, they will then go into the engineering, design and construction phases.

Members of the team could not comment on how long construction might last or when it would begin because no one has agreed that it will be built yet. But there seemed to be a consensus opposition to a completely new span.

“That bridge would have to be so huge that it would have to start at Holy Cross and end in the ocean. You would have to build a monstrosity,” said Rumson resident Ingeborg Perndorfer.

“Stakeholders,” which the officials said includes fire and police departments from both municipalities, Holy Cross School, the two hospitals, marinas, bordering towns and local business owners, already met with the project team earlier this month to discuss their apprehension. The most notable bullet was keeping the bridge open during construction.

The bridge is a vital part of the evacuation on Route 520, but community members cited the last time it underwent repairs as a main concern. It was the early 90s and the bridge was shut down entirely for about three months.

“Business in Sea Bright practically died,” said Rumson resident Jude Skowron.

The next public information meeting will be held in October, when the data collection is finished and the preferred alternative for the bridge will be presented, officials said.

Stacie Fanelli, a sophomore at Syracuse University, is a reporting and photography intern at redbankgreen

Details of the funeral for the late Maria Fernandes, the former Sea Bright mayor, were announced Monday in the SeaBreeze, the borough newsletter.

Dear SeaBreeze Subscribers,

For those of you who have not heard the news, with regret, we report that Honorable Maria Fernandes passed away yesterday morning.

A funeral mass will be held in her memory at 11 a.m., Saturday, March 3, 2012 at Holy Cross Church, 30 Ward Avenue, Rumson, NJ  07760.

In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be sent to:

Holy Cross Time to Build Campaign
Holy Cross Church
30 Ward Avenue
Rumson, N.J. 07760
732-842-0348

Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation
740 Broad Street, Suite 4
Shrewsbury, New Jersey 07702
Phone: 732-219-6654
Fax: 732-219-8722

Here’s the obituary that appeared Wednesday in the Asbury Park Press:

Maria D. Fernandes
AGE: 59 • Former Sea Bright Mayor

Maria D. Fernandes, 59, of Sea Bright, died peacefully on Sunday, February 26, 2012 at Barnabas Health Hospice and Palliative Care Center, Long Branch. Maria was born in Elizabeth and had lived in Sea Bright since 1989. She was a graduate of St. Patrick Grammar School, Battin High School both in Elizabeth and Brookdale Community College, Lincroft. Maria was a supervisor for Delta Import and Export in New York City and for SS White-Pennwalt Dental Company in Holmdel. She was unselfishly dedicated to both the people and the town of Sea Bright as a member of the Planning Board, member of the City Council and Council President, and as Mayor of Sea Bright. She was proud to be the first Portuguese-American female mayor in the state of New Jersey and the third in the United States. She’s credited with helping to obtain $1.5 million in state grants to upgrade the Sea Bright sewer system and $1 million in grants to improve downtown Sea Bright’s infrastructure. She loved being able to help others and make even the smallest of differences. She was also a member of the Ladies Auxiliary of the Sea Bright Fire Department; the Sea Bright Senior Citizens and a communicant of Holy Cross R.C. Church in Rumson.

Maria was predeceased by her father Ernest Fernandes and her maternal grandmother, Jesuina Diaz. Surviving is her mother Adelina Fernandes of Sea Bright.

A Memorial Mass will be celebrated on Saturday March 3, 2012 at 11 am at Holy Cross R.C. Church, 30 Ward Ave, Rumson. Damiano Funeral Home, Long Branch, is in charge of the arrangements. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, 740 Broad Street, Suite 4, Shrewsbury, NJ 07702. The family invites you to leave an online condolence at www.damianofuneralhome.com.

Former Mayor Maria Fernandes of Sea Bright has died, redbankgreen has confirmed.

She passed away at about 10 a.m. Sunday at Monmouth Medical in Long Branch, where she’d been taken by borough emergency volunteers two nights ago for difficulty breathing, according to Councilman Read Murphy, who was on the EMS call.

We’ll have more details Monday.

By JOHN T. WARD

Two adults escaped unhurt as fire tore through the second story of the Rumson home in which they were living Tuesday night, officials said.

The blaze, reported at 8:15 p.m., caused extensive damage to the upstairs portion of the house at 31 Park Avenue. The was no immediate determination of a cause, authorities said.

The identities of the occupants, said by police to be about 27 and 22 years old, were not immediately released, and the owner of the home was not present at the time of the fire. The house is listed in property records as belonging to Patricia Dalton.

Police Sergeant Bob Boyer, who was the first to arrive on the scene, said flames were shooting out of the front, second-story window just beneath a peaked roof. He found the front door locked, went around the to unlocked back door, and made his way through heavy smoke to the front door, which he unlocked for firefighters, he said.

By then, the two occupants had already departed the house, he said.

“They did a real nice job stopping it from making its way down to the first floor,” Boyer said of the firefighters.

As of 9 p.m., Rumson volunteer firefighters, backstopped by counterparts from Sea Bright and Fair Haven, were putting out the last signs of fire and awaiting the arrival of a JCP&L crew to cut power to a live electrical wire downed in the incident.

By JOHN T. WARD

There’s too much stuff on the menu, Cono Trezza is saying.

As a customer of Trezza’s Sea Bright Pizza, you might not think so. There’s pizza, some pasta, calzone, salads. Not too much of anything, and everything is arranged in tidy columns, in large fonts, on a single side of a sheet of paper.

But for Trezza, who recently moved his restaurant one door south of its old address into a 14-foot-wide building, everything these days is about narrowing the focus.

“Small works, big doesn’t,” he says.

Trezza, originally from the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, now lives in Lincroft. For four years, he owned and operated Portobello, a 200-seat restaurant on Hope Road in Tinton Falls. “I used to pack them in on weekends. Weekdays were slow, though,” he said.

It wasn’t a situation he was enamored of, even after he eliminated a six-day-a-week commute from Brooklyn.

“The staff, the overloads, the personnel – for one person, it’s too much.”

Trezza, 47, a former “hairdresser-barber,” opened Sea Bright Pizza six years ago. He “liked the ocean,” he said, but also had “a vision” that would simplify his life.

From Portobello’s five-page menu, “I went to three, to two, and then to one. Now, my goal is this,” he said, folding the menu in half.

“I’m not kidding.”

Not that he’s not proud of what’s on it. Trezza says he shops a couple of times a week at Sickles Market in Little Silver and personally picks out every single vegetable used in his dishes – no buying in bulk –  and uses cheeses, canned tomatoes, and olive oil imported from Italy.

“Whatever’s on here, I eat,” he said. “If I don’t eat it, I don’t like it, I don’t sell it. That’s the way I travel. If it’s good for me, it’s good for everybody else.”

Still, “I want to bring it to where it’s only pizza. Maybe not here, maybe next place, but that’s my goal,” he said.

Why not now?

“You can’t just… I’m well known for my chicken parm and my eggplant parm, so it’s kind of hard to get rid of those two,” he said. “I do a lot of volume in the summer, I do a lot of sandwiches to the beach clubs.” Pizza’s the biggest seller, but he’s not ready to cut off other substantial sources of his revenue quite yet, he suggests.

Besides, at the moment, he’s savoring completion of a big project.

Almost two years ago, he bought the space next door to his trattoria, a 14-foot wide storefront that had been vacant for several years after haberdasher Brian George moved his Northshore Menswear down the street. Trezza gradually transformed the building into a cozy, barnlike eating space with bare brick walls, a pressed-tin ceiling and touches of copper. Trezza calls it “a little bit Tuscany, a little bit SoHo loft.”

And he did it his way.

“No borrowing money, no nothing,” he said. “I just worked and then did it, worked and then did it. But I did it the way I wanted to do it.”