Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By simmons on May 17, 2017

Congregation Beth Ahm on Grove Avenue in Verona.(Photo: Joshua Jongsma/NorthJersey.com)

With the sale of thesynagogue property progressing, residents of Grove Avenue in Verona continueto express concerns over the future of the neighborhood.

The Verona Township Council approved the purchase of the property that housed Congregation Beth Ahm on Grove Avenue with the potential to develop it into a new home for the Verona Rescue Squad. The council voted yes on May 1 to approve the nearly $1 million purchase as the synagogue intends to mergewith another religious institution.

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Though the purchase was approved, a number of residents from the neighborhood still had their doubts, and expressed them duringa May 15 Township Council meeting. Will Battersby of East Reid Place said he believed the council had the best interest of the residents in mind, despite his objections.

We just know putting the Rescue Squad there is the wrong idea, Battersby said.

Instead, he suggested some alternate locations to move the squad. The current Rescue Squad building on Church Street has limited parking and space for the vehicles, and issues with handicapped accessibility, noted Township Manager Matthew Cavallo. The building also lacks a proper training area for the crew, a decontamination area for the equipment, and no place for the volunteers to sleep when covering overnight shifts.

Rather than move it to Grove Avenue, Battersby offered alternatives such as the corner of Linn drive and Bloomfield Avenue, the medical building at 825 Bloomfield Ave., the parking lot at Henrys Fine Food across the street from the current Rescue Squad building, by the Verona Community Pool on Fairview Avenue, and other spots.

The council thanked him for the suggestions, while Cavallo said some of them had problems such as a high price-tag, deed restrictions, or not being for sale.

Tom Bastanza of Grove Avenue said he hoped municipal officials will perform studies related to property values and light and noise pollution in the neighborhood beforethe Rescue Squad relocatesthere.

My objective is that we can have a lot of subjective discussions aboutis it a good use or is it a bad use? Bastanza said. If we can collect some objective data with numbers, I think, then, that will paint a clearer picture.

Trish Calandra said she worried about the traffic and amount of children near Grove and Personette avenues. The area is close to three schools, F.N. Brown, H.B. Whitehorne, and Verona High School, and she had concerns about adding Rescue Squad traffic there.

Your hair can turn white watching that corner, remarked Calandra.

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Paul Olsen of Personette Avenue has lived in Verona for 50 years and described the area as already the third-busiest intersection in the township, afterBloomfield and Mount Prospect, and Bloomfield and Lakeside.

I think putting the Rescue Squad in that spot is going to change the character, Olsen said, and make me very disappointed because we had a jewel there. Modest homes, residential, all the homes you can see are well-maintained and its a special place.

The sale of the property has a tentative closing date of June 1, Cavallo said. After that, any plan to move the Rescue Squad there would still go before the Planning Board and feature opportunity for public review and comment.

This is not something where were going to be moving into the building tomorrow, Cavallo said.

Email: jongsma@northjersey.com

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Concerns persist for Verona residents near synagogue - NorthJersey.com

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