Construction of what was originally the $10 million borough hall moved another step further this week as initial groundwork got underway, in spite of the fact the long awaited construction is now starting at $10.599 million, Kappa Construction of Ocean was the low bidder on construction at that amount.

And borough administrator Michael Muscillo is in communications with FEMA weekly pinning that agency down to a date when the borough will receive the anticipated $5 million included in the original bond ordinance last June.

“I can’t wait for this to be completed!” said a joyous Muscillo, adding, “I think the residents of Highlands will be very happy when it’s done

The former parking lot for Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church was filled to capacity Easter Sunday for morning mass, and filled again early Monday morning, this time with pre-construction equipment signifying work has officially begun on the new $10 million, now $10.599 million boro hall.

Although KAPPA Construction’s low bid was higher than anticipated and bonded for was awarded by the governing body and the new building will house municipal court, all municipal offices, and the police department.

Currently, the site on Route 36 between Valley Avenue and Miller St., which also had included the location of both the convent for the teaching sisters when Our Lady of Perpetual Help School was active, and a private residence on the corner of Miller St. is being cleared and prepared for base work for the new construction.

Muscillo said the time frame for total construction is 18-months, and the borough is anticipating a completion date by October, 2023. “Provided there aren’t any supply chain issues,” the administrator added, in light of long delays in materials and equipment impeding numerous construction projects throughout the country.

The work is partially funded with a grant the borough received in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, which destroyed the former borough hall on Bay avenue. To date, the borough has received approximately $2 million from the Sandy disaster, and is waiting to hear on an additional $5 million.

Muscillo is confident of receiving the additional $5 million, but pointed out the other options should it not be received, including raising additional funds through taxation, or issuing notes or bonds, which would also mean a tax increase. Other options are raising funds from redevelopment projects, reclassifying other projects already set up and applying those funds to the borough hall project, or a combination of any of the possibilities.

Council also had passed a resolution requesting approval of the Director of the Division of Local Government Services to pay the expenditure to set up a “Donations for Borough Hall” fund so interested persons could contribute to offsetting the total cost.

Muscillo added that while the higher than anticipated low bid could increase taxes as one option, there are numerous other factors that also increase municipal taxes, including a decrease in state aid, high health care, pension costs for employees, and more, none of which can be anticipated. Without knowing if and when the borough would get the $5 million, he added, “We’ll cross that bridge IF we come to it.”

Obviously happy that construction is finally underway on a project that has been discussed by three different mayors, several different councils and has met with numerous hurdles, Muscillo said, “We’re moving forward.”

The administrator, who came into his position long after Sandy and the first attempts at constructing a new borough, well knows the long history of meetings, discussions, land acquisition from the Catholic Diocese of Trenton, and more, including the unusual way in which the $10 million bond ordinance was approved.

That began last May, when Council was comprised of Linda Mazzola and KL Martin, along with Mayor Carolyn Broullon, Donald Melnyk and Joann Olszewski. The $10 million bond resolution was introduced by Mayor Broullon, with Martin and Mazzola dissenting.

At that time Martin said he was listening to the people and the cost was too much, and also felt FEMA could not always be trusted to follow through with the funds. Mazzola predicted the final cost would be even higher than that and was too much to expect taxpayers to fund. Both council members said it was not a wise business decision and the resolution failed since four of five votes is necessary for a bond issue.

The following meeting, the same ordinance was introduced once again, this time with Martin absent; with only four members present, it only required three votes to introduce it. Martin was present for the June meeting and the public hearing on the same ordinance he had opposed. This time he voted in favor of the $10 million issue, explaining he was a “complicated person,” and saying it was nobody’s business why he had missed the previous meeting.

With his vote in favor of the issue, along with Broullon, Melnyk and Olszewski, the bond issue passed. Mazzola, once again opposing it, added that the previous December the governing body received notice the cost would most likely be over $12.5 million. No one on Council gave any explanation why the bond ordinance they introduced twice since then did not indicate the additional $2.5 million, nor did any member of council indicate from whence those additional funds would come. Nor was there any response to Mazzola’s recommendation the bond issue be put on a referendum to be voted on by residents. The meeting was held in person, with no access for residents to attend virtually.

With KAPPA’s bid of 10.6 million, acquisition and design cost, it appears Mazzola may be spot on with her estimate, and very likely, she may even have cited a conservative dollar amount.

There is a startling memorial at Exchange Place in Jersey City which not only depicts the slaughter of thousands of Polish officers more than 80 years ago but was also itself the topic of some controversy in the 21st century.

The Memorial is highlighted in Middletown historian and author Randall Gabrielan’s book, “Jersey City, A Monumental History” as one of the monuments to see at Exchange Place. This is a well-known area of Jersey City created in the mid-1850s by extending Montgomery Street on fill in order to enable the NJ Railroad & Transportation company to build a dock and terminal facilities.

Created by Polish-American sculptor Andrzej Pitynski the Katyn Memorial is a 34-foot tall bronze statue depicting a bound and gagged Polish soldier with a bayoneted rifle impaled through his back. It stands on top of a granite base that contains some soil from Katyn. The base also shows a Polish woman carrying her starving child in memorial to the Polish citizens deported to Siberia, a move that began shortly before the massacre.

The backstabbing portion of the statue was designed to recall the killings that  occurred while Poland was defending itself from the German invasion, and the attack by the Soviets at that time was like “being stabbed in the back.”  More than depicting the Russian forest, the word Katyn has become a symbol of all the betrayals the Poles suffered and to many represents Poland itself and its martyrdom at the hands of others.

The Katyn massacre, named for the Russian forest of Katyn where the atrocities took place, killed not only thousands of Polish Army officers but also intellectual leaders who had interned at Kozielsk or were imprisoned at Ostashkov and Starobielsk by the Soviet People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs, the Soviet secret police, or NKVD, in 1940.

Since its installation at Exchange Place in 1991,  the monument has been the subject of strong divided local opinion.  Some residents view it as ugly, vulgar, and depicting too much violence and death to be in such a busy area.

Others view it as a graphic reminder of what Polish soldiers suffered, and see it as a darkly beautiful memorial.

Others feel the discomfort it brings to those who view it are the right emotions for a war memorial.

It all came to a head in 2018, when Mayor Steven Fulop said there were plans to move the monument to another location close by, as the area was being redeveloped and that particular spot was selected for a new Riverside park, forcing the removal of the statue for the new development.

However, the Polish American population immediately set up a protest and filed a lawsuit against the governing body, charging it was their memorial and they had not been included in any decision making.  Others joined the Polish American protest, simply on the grounds they did not like the redevelopment plan at all.

Within days, the Memorial controversy became an international incident. The Polish ambassador to the United States went to social media to protest the proposed removal. Politicians in Poland charged Jersey City with disrespect of Polish heroes. The Mayor accused at least one of them of being an anti-Semite, prompting more possible legal action.  The developer scheduled to renovate the area and remove the statue called it “gruesome,” causing the designer to call the developer a “schmuck.”  Some questioned why the statue was in Jersey City in the first place.

That was answered with the knowledge that Polish Americans  came to the area after the end of the war; that was a time  when there were more political refugees from Poland than any other country of Europe and more than 10,000 of them settled in New Jersey. A group of Polish veterans wanted to design a memorial to show the tragedies through which they had lived.

But there was even more to the controversy, Old-time Jersey City residents did not like all the new development, commercial and residential, that was changing their city. Newspapers carried the stories from all angles, and the Polish American community expressed disappointment and betrayal one more time.

All the publicity, negativity, anger of the city‘s old-time blue collar workers, and the Polish-American community led to the Polish President, who had already made one visit to Jersey City years before, visiting the statue and saying a new location would be okay with him if it had to be. That brought another stream of protests and cries of “betrayal.”

In the end, with several heated council meetings, petitions signed and presented and a public referendum scheduled to see what the people had to say in the ballot box, the city council backed down. After months of controversy, five days before Christmas, the Jersey City City Council unanimously adopted an ordinance that the Katyn Memorial monument would remain in perpetuity in its location in Exchange Place.

Weekly Dress Talks are continuing at the Monmouth County Library’s Eastern Branch featuring curators from the Shrewsbury Historical Society.

The Historical Society has offered the series for throughout the Spring, beginning with three programs in April, and continuing weekly in May

The talks focus on the historic and beautiful wedding gowns in the Society’s collection, some of which are now on display at the Eastern Branch, located at 1001 Route 35. Curators tell visitors some of the stories behind the dresses, as well as the restoration process each has gone through in order to be preserved and displayed in the Historical Society’s collections.

The next Dress Talk will be Tuesday May 17 at 2 p.m., followed by the last talk in May on May 25 at 7 p.m. There are three additional talks scheduled for June 9, June 16 and June 28 at various hours both during the day and in the evening.

Registration is available by calling the library at 732-683-8980.

For further information on the Historical Society, which is located in the Borough of Shrewsbury Municipal Complex at the historic Four Corners, visit their website at ShrewsburyHistoricalSocietynj.org, or write the Society at P.O. Box 333, Shrewsbury, NJ 07702.

Visits to the Museum are by appointment only and can be made by calling 732-530-7974, or 732747-3635 or e-mail ShrewsburyHistoricalSociety@gmail.com