It certainly doesn’t give me any pleasure to say it, announce it, or ask you to prove it to yourselves. Based on their words and actions, it’s an obvious conclusion that the Atlantic Highlands Mayor and Council have finally convinced me. They really don’t want the people of Atlantic Highlands to know what they’re doing, or what’s going on.  Nor do they care an awful lot about regionalization.

And they’re doing it in so many ways, some of them even effective. All of them costing money and hurting residents who really want to know what’s going on in town. People who thought, rightfully, that since the days of Thomas Jefferson, they had that right to ask questions and what’s going on in their hometowns and every level of government.

The Council lost the Battle to keep people from asking questions at public meetings. Kind of silly the way they lost it, though. But effective.

You see, when people in the audience kept complaining they couldn’t ask questions because the borough attorney kept saying they couldn’t, one of the council members, or maybe more than one, thought that maybe they should listen to the people for half a second and check it out.

So, the administrator, who said he has the right to direct the attorney to research any issue raised by one or more council members. Did ask to have something done. But he did not ask another of the dozen or so attorneys on the borough’s payroll to check out the legality of Ms. Schaeffer’s directive. No indeed, he asked Ms. Schaeffer to research it herself.

Now you have the borough attorney getting paid to research the fact she had the law wrong in the first place. Then she fixed it up with a letter she wrote, and she read it to the mayor and council first in secret, then to the public minutes later.

So is the answer for an attorney to make mistakes, then get paid to research their own mistakes? But in the end, outside of any added costs for correcting an error that went on for too long, that’s fixed, and the public can ask questions.  Great news.  You should be asking yourself … What’s going on?

Next let’s look at the upcoming Council meeting.

The second meeting of April is not on a Thursday night like every other month. It’s a Wednesday night. According to the administrator, “that’s because to my knowledge, the meeting was scheduled for the 26^th at the request of a council member who had a conflict in schedule.” He did not name the councilman or councilwoman who made the request.

Not to worry, said the administrator, ”to my knowledge the meeting was  in the yearly schedule for council meetings approved by mayor and council at the reorginazation meeting.”

But I did not get any answer to my question of whether that reason still exists that made it so important to switch the meeting to conduct borough business to another night four months ago still exists.

Well, wanting to be sure I had my facts right, I did look at the reorganization once again. Yep, it’s there, right smack in front of your eyes on page 20 of 33 pages of reorganization meeting. It gives the date of the second meeting in April as April 26, and the administrator was correct once again. The resolution doesn’t give the actual day of the week, just the date of the month. So, with no reason to think four months ago that it’s changed from a Thursday to a Wednesday one month out of the year, I’d say it’s easy to overlook, even for someone who takes the bother to go through 20 pages of a meeting four months previous.

Ah, but look a little closer at that reorganization resolution.  You get a little hint something might be different here if you’re astute and read closely. Right smack next to the April 26 date there’s a little asterisk like this *.  But the * doesn’t refer you to anywhere else or tell you why there’s a little * there. Could be a typo for all anyone knows since there’s no given for what it means.

Ah, something must be wrong. So I went to the AHNJ.com home page that is so full of up-to-date news about what’s going on in Atlantic Highlands.

It’s usually pretty wonderful, though now I wonder about that as well since I don’t know what news is NOT put on that page. Lots of good stuff is listed, things from the Employee of the Month, Election Poll Workers are needed, the upcoming Garage Sale, congratulations to the Police Chief on yet another accomplishment the borough can take pride in, and even the change in recycling so it’s also going to be the Fifth Wednesdays of the month, something Councilman Jim Murphy has been announcing the last couple of meetings. But there is absolutely nothing saying that, in spite of the large letters at the top of the page that proclaim Council meetings are the 2 and 4^Th Thursday of the month, not a single word saying that simply isn’t so in April.  You should be asking yourself … What’s going on?

But there is still another insult to the integrity of those interested in watching their municipal governing body at work.  Yet another insult to taxpayers, residents, guests or any outsider who wants to attend a meeting of the governing body of this town.

Check out the borough’s magnificent calendar that goes free to anyone who wants it and is full of great old-time photos of life in the quieter, softer, different Atlantic Highlands. There are always some available for the taking on the counter at Borough Hall, a really nice gesture.

But look at April.  Check out April 26. You’ll read on this calendar the taxpayers paid for, that they’re recycling, for Zones 2 &4, there’s an Open Space meeting, and there’s a Henry Hudson Board of Education meeting!

But there’s no Atlantic Highlands Borough Council meeting listed on April 26.

Study the calendar a little closer. Yep, there it is….

The taxpayer funded Atlantic Highlands calendar most folks hang near their desks or in their kitchen cabinet clearly shows the Atlantic Highlands Borough Council meeting is at 7 p.m….April 19.  You should be asking yourself … What’s going on?

So, if you went tonight, sorry, hopefully it did not happen and the calendar is wrong and the reorganization meeting, asterisk or not, and the administrator’s e-mail to me, are accurate.

The meeting is set for next Wednesday, April 26, at 7 p.m.

Again, is there something wrong here as well?  That is the same night as the Henry Hudson Regional School Board of Education meeting… a regularly scheduled meeting.

Doesn’t anyone on the Atlantic highlands Borough Council think that at the height of all the discussion about whether the current superintendent should be re-hired for another two or five years, at the height of the long-drawn-out time when so many are trying so hard to get a regionalization question put on the ballot so the people can have their say, this is a smart idea? After hearing council members refuse to answer questions at meetings and instead telling residents to go to board of education meetings and ask questions of them, is it really fair to schedule their own meeting the same night as a board of education regularly scheduled meeting?

Or is that a way to reduce the number who attend one or another of those two important meetings?

You should be asking yourself … What’s going on?

There are those who laughed when Atlantic Highlands Councilman Jim Murphy listed as one of his accomplishments that “he makes every meeting,” his way of explaining when he takes on a commitment, he keeps his commitment.

But last night, residents got to see the importance of just such a commitment…they were that close to not having a quorum for a regular council meeting on an evening set aside last January for a regular meeting.

There’s nothing wrong with councilmembers taking vacations, but why do they have to do it when they have a  meeting to discuss regular business, let alone something as important as getting a school regionalization question on the ballot so the public can have their say?

There’s nothing wrong with not being able to be present, thanks to the wonders of ZOOM, even given as imperfect as it is in this borough. But shouldn’t there be checks on the system first? What happened to the training to operate the system that was reportedly included in the cost? Why really does the engineer have to take on the chore? Or the councilwoman?

There are exceptions to being present, of course, and even council members need to put borough business aside to tend to personal commitments. That is seemingly what happened to Councilman Brian Dougherty since his line of work sometimes makes it difficult to be in two places at one time.

But this meeting was a disaster from the very start, for so many different reasons.

It started a few minutes late, since all the councilmen present…three of them…were not in their seats.

Then there were all the opps and ahs, the “can you hear me Eileen?” or “We can hear you!” or “Eileen put your speaker on” and so much more that went into finally getting, it seems, Councilwoman Cusick into the meeting via zoom.  Isn’t any of this stuff checked out in advance?

And was Councilwoman Cusick really present? It didn’t look like you could see her lips moving…you already knew you couldn’t hear her on the ZOOM screen, yet they said she voted on a couple of things. We’ll never know for sure; the only time you can hear her was approval of the minutes of the previous meeting. You couldn’t hear some other responses in the meeting room and there aren’t ZOOM video recordings available, so how does one know?

It only got worse  when it came to the expensive but hardly present special attorney for school regionalization, Matthew Giacobbe.  Of course he wasn’t present in person, rarely has been.

He wasn’t there at the beginning of the meeting on zoom either; he wasn’t even there when the meeting started late. Nor was he there when they first tried to get him on ZOOM when it came to the regionalization item on the agenda.  When all that folderol was squared away, all the laughter and talk about the PBA Ball and what’s going to be happening there filled in the gap, Mr. Giacobbe was finally able to be seen and heard. He did answer questions, he did talk, he did give a sort of update, but not nearly as broad or easily understandable as Vito Gagliardi had given the night before at the Highlands special meeting.  He sounded a little confused by some of the questions, but did agree, that it is the petition that was filed nine months ago that just needs some numbers filled in on the blank spots that is being discussed at the mediation.   But could he stay for more questions? Of course not! He apologized, he was so sorry, but he had another commitment.   He was in the middle of contract negotiations with someone else. Really? Isn’t being paid by Atlantic Highlands  as important as someplace else? Rather insulting, it seems.

But nobody on council chided him for his lack of interest, commitment or concern for this borough’s tax payers. They simply thanked him for his time. Just as he had politely thanked them earlier   “for having me” when he finally arrived via zoom.   They are paying him, aren’t they?

But as he’s done in the past, administrator Rob Ferragina stepped up to smooth feathers and offer an alternative to cover for the attorney. Sure, anyone can send him questions or make statements, the administrator explained. He’ll be sure to get them to Mr. Giacobbe or his office and get them answered.  Very nice, and appreciated, yet another responsibility for an administrator who seems to take on a lot and try to resolve even more.

Cheers for Mr. Giacobbe though. He did make one thing clear, just as Mr. Gagliardi had done the night before.

The mediation is the key and it’s next Friday. Once Highlands and Atlantic Highlands agree on how they’re going to split the millions Sea Bright will be bringing in, the clerk can simply fill in the blank on that resolution that was approved by all three towns nine months ago, and forward it to the Commissioner of Education. He also said it looked kind of positive at that level, since the Commissioner already dismissed the complaints against Sea Bright.  With her knowing the money that would be coming in from Sea Bright, realizing the law that was passed that actually encourages the addition of Sea Bright in a new regional school district,  knowing she’s already dismissed any complaints from Oceanport and Shore Regional about how can Sea Bright do such a thing, even though they still have a few days in which to file an appeal,  all she has to do is check out the figures, read again that the three towns have all agreed to regionalize and pay for it and voila! The voters can decide in November if they want to save money and improve education for all the kids in three towns  from pre-K through high school.

But back to the rudeness. Listening to the recording of the meeting only makes you sick. Not only do an elected official and a paid contractor talk while someone else is talking, albeit just between themselves, they’re so loud it’s difficult for a recording listener to catch every word from the person at the mike. And commenting that one person’s public comments are “ridiculous” is downright terrible.

The meeting was held April 13, the 280th birthday of Thomas Jefferson, the writer of the Declaration, founder of the University of Virginia, and President of the United States who always firmly believed, and said and practiced so often in so many ways, that the public needs to be heard and even listened to. He obviously would not have looked at this meeting as a birthday gift he would want for citizens of the United States.