Brick Council: Let The Bands Play

There’s a running joke that on St. Patrick’s Day, everyone is Irish.

Tuesday night at the Brick Township Council meeting, everyone was a marching band member -- or so it seemed -- as the council unanimously approved a limited suspension of the township’s noise ordinance specifically for the marching bands at both Brick Memorial and Brick Township high schools to allow the bands to rehearse, hold competitions and play at football games without fear of running afoul of the law.

“I was in the marching band for four years at Franklin,” Council Vice President Jim Fozman said in casting his vote in favor of the suspension. “Let them play.”

The unanimous vote was met with resounding applause from the parents and supports of the Brick Memorial High School Marching Band, which had drawn widespread attention last week after Brick Township police officers shut down a rehearsal in response to complaints from neighbors on Alexander Avenue, saying the band was in violation of the decibel level of the noise ordinance.

The ordinance suspension is limited to the decibels produced by the bands during rehearsals, festivals and other performances, Mayor John Ducey said. The dates and times the ordinance is suspended for the bands’ activities are tailored specifically to dates the school district requested, he said, Schools Superintendent Walter Uszenski and Board of Education members Sharon Cantillo, Frank Pannucci and Karyn Cusanelli were present at the meeting but did not speak.

Ducey said Wednesday morning that the ordinance suspension applies to this year only.

“It’s the quickest way to do it because it can be done by resolution,” he said via email. But he said last week that he would seek a an amendment to the ordinance to provide a permanent solution to the issue, which was turning into an annual conflict.

The issue that erupted a week ago had been brewing since the previous year. Neighbors complained in the summer and fall of 2013 about the volume of the Brick Memorial band’s rehearsals, and an agreement was reached where the band agreed to move some of its rehearsals to the school’s football field. But confusion in August led to more complaints from the neighbors, and frustrated parents took their complaints to social media and to radio station NJ 101.5, concerned the band’s rehearsals were going to be signficantly limited or even stopped.

Ducey said that was what prompted him to seek the limited suspension of the ordinance, echoing his statements from last week where he said he would seek a more permanent resolution.

“We’ve done it for Walmart, we’ve done it for others,” he said.

“The arts and music are somewhat forgotten, but they are very important,” Ducey said. ”We need to support an activity that is positive for kids.”