Local Open Space Fund to be Absorbed to Patch Budget in 2019

Open Space Referendum Proposal for Ballot in November 2019. The Ratable Chase is over.

This is where the tax ratable chase has left Parsippany; over developed in financial disarray no local landscape worth acquiring?!

Last nights Council Meeting 2/19/19, revealed a budget proposal to use "local open space" funding to finance Parks & Forestry in covering athletic field maintenance costs, to be put on a November 2019 Referendum.
No open space worth acquiring now exists in Parsippany. One must ask does this include maintenance of BOE artificial turf fields or any fields of play owned by the
Parsippany BOE? We must also ask; why their present budget does not include such costs?

We must remember the past administrations attempt to use open space funding for the so-called field of dreams proposal, which was overwhelming voted down. Then months later, BOE stated they had found nearly $4 million dollars in their budget, which was not returned to the taxpayers but used for the artificial turf; exactly what the field of dreams intended open space for. Somehow an end-run around the voters’ wishes, accomplished what the field of dreams referendum could not.

Perhaps some audit needs to occur in the finances of the BOE? $4million found in budget, just like that of taxpayers’ money!

Let us consider the following before deciding upon surrendering our local open space funding for possible inappropriate uses concerning the budget. I have here listed possible continued use of the local open space funds (amount unknown). They are the following:

1. Support Troy Meadows projects. Troy Meadows is a main component of Parsippany Master Plan goals/objectives. (In my opinion, ignored and not implemented properly, along its Troy Brook upstream sources)
2. Mitigations within Flood Plain of theTroy Brook, Stormwater Study Rutgers, Professor Chris Obropta.
3. Used to support other purchases in Morris County or Northern NJ in expanding existing parks.
4. Impervious surface conversions upgrades
5. Cleanups in existing areas of open space; Forge Pond, Troy Brook for example.
6. The parcel of woods still standing at the proposed Habitat for Humanity on Park Place in Glacial Hills Section, should be considered as a last. A proposal to purchase to lot for preservation to maintain neighborhood character was announced last night by a Park Place resident that has been trying to preserve the wooded lot.

We must also confirm from reliable sources that in fact no environmentally sensitive areas remain. Our Highlands Council friend can help us with this.

What we see is not only a financial situation brought on by past short-term political solutions, many betraying the citizens of Parsippany, but an environmental crisis of overdevelopment with no thought of cost avoidance scenarios in cumulative effects such as pollution and speculation development now empty on ruined land. We must not continue the separate rather than connected reality of economy without ecology.

The last possible landscape worth saving was Block 421 Lot 29 waterview. Everything was there to accomplish this. This should never be forgotten; now no land worth saving. Sad but true, this is where the ratable chase as taken Parsippany back into the hands of corporate developers and unions that will do anything for a buck, including undermining your community.

My questions: how has the Waterview Fiasco Open Space buffer purchase for $3.7 Million for 9.26 acres affected our budget overall remains unanswered.

This is where the ratable chase has left Parsippany; over developed in financial disarray; and accepting PILOT deals in fear of builders lawsuits in the face of the Affordable Housing Obligation. If we only planned for all this, rather than just reacted to developers plans, rather than our own Master plan and good land use science. (all photos Parsippany landscapes).