Sourabh ‘Sam’ Jain plans to open Bombay River Indian Restaurant Saturday. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
After just two months of vacancy, the space that held Red Bank’s only Vietnamese restaurant is about to open as an Indian restaurant — with a culinary twist.
Also in this edition of redbankgreen‘s Retail Churn: news of a beauty supply shop putting the cap on its lipstick one last time.
Jobs and after-school programs are on the cutting block unless the state comes through with an additional $750,000, said Superintendent Jared Rumage. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
The average Red Bank homeowner would pay about $117 more in taxes to support borough schools this year if New Jersey legislators don’t come through with more funding, Superintendent Jared Rumage said Tuesday night.
Even with the levy increase, the local primary and middle schools could see cuts in staffing and extracurricular programs such as jazz band and the fledgling cross-country track team, he said.
HABcore hopes to win approval to build a four-apartment addition to the rear of the two-family home it owns at 119 River Street. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
A nonprofit housing organization’s proposed expansion of a house it owns on Red Bank’s West Side ran into some resistance at the zoning board last week.
While board members agreed that HABcore’s plan to add four apartments to what’s now a two-family house on River Street is “inherently beneficial” as defined by zoning law, at least one board member expressed concern that it would result in “a huge building for this neighborhood.”
The charter school’s main building, on Oakland Street. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
The Red Bank Charter School does not engage in “segregative” enrollment practices, the New Jersey Department of Education ruled last week in upholding the school’s latest five-year operating charter.
In letter dated April 16 to the charter school, Acting Education Commissioner Lamont Repollet rejected assertions of bias by Fair Schools Red Bank and the Latino Coalition of New Jersey, and found instead that the charter school “is seeking, ‘to the maximum extent practicable,’ to enroll a cross-section of Red Bank Borough’s school-age population.”
The on-again, off-again start to Spring 2018 felt gloriously on again as thousands of food and music fans packed the Red Bank International Beer, Wine & Food Fest Sunday.
Jim Scavone, executive director of event host Red Bank RiverCenter, told redbankgreen that the event, held under cloudless skies with temperatures cracking 60 degrees, was packed within 15 minutes of its noontime start, with attendance levels holding steady over the course of the next seven hours.
Monday’s weather outlook is for more of the same, according to the National Weather Service: ample sunshine and a high of about 60 degrees, though the on-again, off-again isn’t quite over. Here’s the forecast through the coming week: (Photos by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
Metalachi is scheduled to end its current East Coast tour in Red Bank Sunday. (Photo by Dave Burke. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Metalachi, billing itself as ‘the World’s First and Only Heavy Metal Mariachi Band,’ is scheduled to help spice up the Red Bank International Beer, Wine and Food Fest Sunday.
The band’s sonic and visual mashup adds a new dimension to the event, slated to take place under sunny skies in the borough’s White Street parking lot.
A well-regarded New Jersey chef has won borough approval to open a restaurant, called Café Loret, at the corner of Broad Street and Peters Place. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Downtown Red Bank is losing one restaurant and gaining another, redbankgreen‘s Retail Churn has learned.
Also in this roundup of comings and goings at street level: a signmaker has a new space, though you wouldn’t know it given the absence, so far, of any signage on the storefront.
Ziad Andrew Shehady in his Springfield office with his dog, Sheeba, in 2017. (Photo courtesy of Ziad Andrew Shehady. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Ziad Andrew Shehady, the incoming borough administrator of Red Bank, has a vision: local government done right, so that it’s viewed as “head and shoulders above” the norm, “like Amazon and Microsoft.
“New York is a great city to go to, and Red Bank is a great town to go to, but nobody looks at the municipal government and says, ‘wow, that is a municipality that is really doing government well,'” Shehady said in a telephone interview with redbankgreen Tuesday afternoon.
The intersection of Broad Street and East Bergen Place was racked with potholes Tuesday morning, shortly before a borough crew arrived to do some patching. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
One of Red Bank’s nastiest pothole clusters got a temporary fix Tuesday.
A more permanent one is in the works, borough officials said.
Power utility Jersey Central Power & Light reported isolated power outages on the Greater Red Bank Green as sporadic heavy rain and strong winds lashed the area early Monday. As of 7 a.m., the company reported 853 Monmouth County customers without power.
The rain, possibly accompanied by thunderstorms and coastal flooding, is expected to continue until around 2 p.m.
Here’s the National Weather Service forecast:
The crime and arrest reports below were provided by the Red Bank Police Department for the period of March 16 to March 31, 2018. This information is unedited. For additional information, please scroll to the bottom of this post.
CRIMES
Criminal Mischief: On 03/17/18 it was reported two unknown individuals were seen damaging a window to a store front in the area of E Front St. Ptl. Tanner Shea.
Criminal Mischief: On 03/18/18 in the area of Broad St it was reported a delivery vehicle’s window was shattered while it was parked. Ptl. Frank Metta.
An unidentified motorist tooled through downtown Red Bank in a roadster as a hint of spring arrived under gray skies Thursday.
The Greater Green is in for two more days of top-down weather before things get cooler wetter. Here’s the National Weather Service forecast:
Ziad Andrew Shehady reading to young students in Springfield last month. (Photo courtesy of Ziad Andrew Shehady. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
The Red Bank council approved the hiring Wednesday night of a new borough administrator, giving the town’s most powerful unelected job to an Army veteran who became the mayor of a Union County town at the age of 25.
And his salary will be triple that of his predecessor.
Takeout sushi for breakfast? From his Red Bank office Wednesday morning, lawyer Sean Byrnes spied this osprey eating a fish atop a utility pole behind the Woman’s Club on Broad Street, a good half mile away from the nearest body of water.
Humans might also find themselves in the mood for some outdoor dining Thursday, when temperatures are expected to peak in the low 60s under partly sunny skies, according to the National Weather Service. (Photos by Sean Byrnes. Click to enlarge.)
The student leaders behind the Ridge Road Run 5K, as seen on Ridge Road, are (left to right): RBR senior Michael Eulner, Shrewsbury; sophomore Claudia Kelly, Little Silver; senior Thomas Lloyd, Shrewsbury; RFH senior Ellie Gibney, Fair Haven; RBC senior Lily Salcedo; RFH senior Teddy Sourlis, Rumson; and RBC senior Courtney Carroll, Middletown.
[Press release from Red Bank Regional]
The sports rivalries among three Two River schools are legendary. It is always a super sweet victory when the Red Bank Regional (RBR) Buccaneers can defeat Red Bank Catholic (RBC) Caseys or Rumson Fair Haven’s (RFH) Bulldawgs, and vice versa for all three teams, two of which are located on Ridge Road, and the other not too far away.
However, seven students from all three schools have recently collaborated to use that rivalry to generate a very positive event.
Borough resident Keith May speaking at the second of two sessions held Monday. Below, some of the suggestions recorded during the first session. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
Invoking the planning process that resulted in the creation of Riverside Gardens Park two decades ago, Red Bank officials launched an effort Monday to remake nearby Marine Park.
At two public brainstorming sessions held at borough hall, residents and visitors weighed in on such matters as small-vessel access to the Navesink River, parking, river cruises and the future of the park’s clay tennis courts, among other topics.
First came new restrooms (above), sewer pumps and lighting. Up next in Red Bank’s Marine Park Improvement Project is an evening of public input sessions on what to do with the 2.2-acre facility on the Navesink River.
The husband-and-wife founders of Red Bank’s Two River Theater have donated $5 million to kick off a fundraiser for Riverview Medical Center, the hospital’s parent organization announced Thursday. And it’s not the first time, either.
[UPDATE: The zoning board hearing on the Wawa proposal was postponed Thursday at the applicant’s request, and is now scheduled to be held May 3, according to the borough planning office.]
A controversial plan to build a supersized Wawa convenience store and gas station at one of Red Bank’s busiest intersections returns for its third hearing by the borough zoning board Thursday night.
JJ’s Delicasies, at 21 West Front Street, features a swirling logo on the sidewalk out front, thanks to a projector. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
In this edition of redbankgreen‘s Retail Churn, one of Red Bank’s hot vegan restaurants is building a separate takeout place, while a 24-hour gym, a barber shop and a cryotherapy spa all have plans to set up shop downtown.
Meantime, two businesses — a restaurant and a women’s clothing shop — have opened in recent days.
A view of the Navesink from Riverview Medical Center in Red Bank last month. Below, Bill Heddendorf of the New Jersey DEP discusses the need for additional testing along the Spring Street storm sewer line in Red Bank. (Photo above by Trish Russoniello, below by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)
By JOHN T. WARD
An effort to reverse biological contamination in the Navesink River is “working,” and could result in the reopening of closed shellfish beds a year earlier than previously expected, a New Jersey environmental scientist told a gathering in Rumson last week.
A day after temperatures climbed into the mid-60s, winter roared back to life Monday morning, leaving a forsythia shrub on Prospect Avenue in Red Bank laden with snow.
Worse for drivers, the wet snow made for sloppy and slippery conditions, with several minor accidents reported by local police.
April arrived Sunday, bringing springlike temperatures in the mid-60s to the Greater Red Bank Green. But the forecast for Monday, or at least a few hours of it, was somewhat more wintry.
GOP Chairman Michael Clancy at last October’s Halloween parade. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge.)
By JOHN T. WARD
With its two incumbents dropping out, the Red Bank Republican party on Thursday chose its chairman and a newcomer to run for borough council this year, redbankgreen has learned.
Party head Michael Clancy will be joined on the ticket by Bank Street resident Allison Gregory on a ticket in which the mayoral slot will be blank, Clancy said Friday.
