HANOVER — Thank you very much everyone for being here with us tonight and Happy New Year!
I would like to begin by congratulating John Ferramosca on another very successful campaign to continue to serve on the Hanover Township Committee for 3 more years. It is an honor to serve with you John on this governing body. Thank you and thank you for your continued service.
I would also like to thank the entire Township Committee for what I believe was another very productive year. Together we had quite a few accomplishments this year which are being noticed and enjoyed by our residents and neighboring municipalities.
I would like to thank our entire Municipal workforce, everyone on our professional staff, every single person that volunteers, anyone on our Boards, Councils, Commissions, or Committees, all of the people that serve tirelessly with all of our organized sports, our scouts and of course, thank you to our Knights of Columbus and all of our houses of worship.
I would like to thank Joe Giorgio/James Brown – The hardest working man in show business – Joe is the hardest working man in Hanover Township.
I would like to thank Krista DiGiorgio, Linda DiArchangel, Bill Byrne, Brian Foran, Brian DiPrimo, Tom Quirk, Denise Brennan, and Sean Donlon for all your hard work.
A very special thank you to Fred Semrau. You are not only my brother, but you are also Hanover Township’s brother. You are phenomenal.
In the Re-Organization meetings of 2023 and 2024, we began to discuss utilizing new strategies and structures in order to produce on an even higher level for the benefit all our residents of Hanover Township by using every single resource available.
We worked on and began to implement new, more aggressive strategies almost immediately, so at this time, I would like to run through some of our initiatives that have been very successful, especially in the last 12 to 18 months.
- The TAPinto Hanover Township, which in less than two years is the second most popular and read TAPinto in Morris County.
- We created “Ask Your Governing Body”. This is any question, anytime, today we believe is more important than ever to be available in as many ways as possible to all of the people that we represent
Year 2 of our official Hanover Township Facebook and Instagram pages are also a very big help to get accurate information out to our residents in real-time.
We are constantly working to better communicate with all of our professionals and any developer interested in becoming part of our community. We have been bringing in the absolute best professional services to work alongside our in-house staff, specifically to move projects along at a much more acceptable pace and to also take on and complete some projects entirely. I believe everyone can see the benefit of this practice.
I’ve said and began to practice aggressively once the legal back and forth takes place regarding zones and zone changes, and we have to dust ourselves off and work together to make it much less likely to have stalled construction projects, piles of dirt and rock that look awful and have no tax benefit to off-set the costs of running Hanover Township on at least an acceptable level.
Please take a look at some of the re-development construction that is taking place right now. Please know there is an incredible number of meetings, phone calls, hard work and discussions long before a written proposal goes to our professional team and from there to the Planning Board. We are working to make Hanover Township much more competitive while at the same time maintaining what we all love about HT.
In 2023 into 2024, we’ve called in and spent countless hours dealing with property owners, architects, development companies, our municipal professionals and of course Joe Giorgio and our municipal attorney Fred Semrau to work together to turn these piles of dirt and rock into beautiful businesses that we can shop in, enjoy and generate much needed tax revenue for HT.
The Former Morris County Mall
Pine Plaza
Chimney Rock
Molly Malones
Drive throughs
Signage
South Jefferson
We are also working to understand the best way to re-purpose outdated industrial areas, office buildings, and other areas that currently have outdated zoning. What we can do to create business friendly zoning to gain additional ratables while maintaining the look and feel of the township we all call home.
A perfect example is the former Morris County Mall which was zoned for a shopping center in 1971. Once that came to my attention, I immediately got on the phone with my colleagues and that zone was changed in record time. Look at that property today.
As a musician and “not being an athlete” I often refer to “Ensemble play”, or collaboration rather than teamwork but it’s the exact same principle, more and more we work to lean on each other’s strengths, and try to push in the same direction rather than towards one another.
We see through everyday practice; that this theory has incredible benefits. We have been using it more and more in Hanover Township, I believe we can see and feel true progress.
This concept and structure when applied on a regional approach has already enabled us to take on serious issues that involve Hanover Township and our surrounding municipalities with very good results.
To list a few very good examples we created and in 2024 made much stronger very aggressive regional partnerships to better understand and help people in need, especially in the areas of Drug Abuse, Alcohol Abuse, and Mental Health we have had and scheduled on a regular basis Mental Health Symposiums. We just hosted several very successful events here and we are now partnering with municipalities throughout North Jersey to host these types of programs for more and more people.
We are confident these efforts have helped thousands and thousands of people, and this Coalition of Wonderful People has been recognized by the State of New Jersey as a recipient of the Jefferson Award by the Governor of New Jersey.
This type of collaboration is more and more important due to the fact that we are still seeing the adverse effects of people being isolated for so long due to the Covid-19 crisis, especially our youngsters and our senior citizens. We are just beginning to understand the emotional toll this has taken on so many people. So, it’s truly a blessing for all of us to be able to work with such wonderful selfless people and organizations. The partnership we now have with The Mental Health Association is worth its weight in gold. Thank you to The Mental Health Association. We love you guys.
The partnership we also have with Morris County Sheriff James Gannon and the Morris County Sheriff’s Office is a true gift from God. Thank you, Sheriff, you know how much we all appreciate you and your great work.
Another example of this type of outreach, that several of us worked very hard to create – The Whippany/Passaic River Flood Remediation Task Force.
We worked with and created a six-municipality legal shared service agreement with Hanover Township which is the lead agency with several top experts to do a realistic analysis of the Whippany River from Morristown to 280 and the Passaic River from Chatham to Eagle Rock Avenue in East Hanover.
We initially identified 6 to 7 areas that are critical and need to be addressed if we truly expect to remediate any of our flooding issues. We have now identified 6 to 8 more and have a field visit scheduled with our team, Colliers and the USDA. Also included in this analysis were hard recommendations, and a sliding chart of potential costs. Needless to say this is big money that we do not have.
Update: We now have the money!
$2 million dollars and $1.2 million towards The Army Corp of Engineers
USDA Colliers 6 spots
6 to 8 additional spots
Awarded the contract
Going in the water within 10 days and very soon going to announce the specifics of a major 5 municipality river cleanup for this spring involving many, many volunteers and professionals
This will at least get us started on this major long overdue infrastructure improvement, and this is just the beginning.
$3.2 million dollars is real money and will benefit Hanover Township immensely!
That is an example of a new partnership with Hanover Township, East Hanover, Florham Park, Morristown, Morris Plains, Morris Township, and Parsippany.
These types of relationships and partnerships can only be built on Trust and Respect which I believe must be earned, and Hanover Township is trusted and respected. This type of structure enables us to combine our resources in a much more focused and aggressive manner, working with the best people, which will better assure a positive result.
Just a few additional highlights that haven’t been touched on:
You’ll see on Township Committee assignments, that there is a newer detail that Committeeman Brian Cahill is taking the lead on, that is HR Succession. This is a new structure we have put in place to better prepare Hanover Township for the future, on the professional side.
Periodically we all joke about how fast times goes, but it does, and another goal we all share is we want to leave HT in a better place and leave as little to chance as possible.
An additional succession plan has been launched that seems to be working very well is a major outreach to encourage more and more of our residents to get more involved in any of our boards, committees, councils or commissions.
The goal is once again to encourage the best available people to work together to create new solutions to new problems, not to mention new solutions to older problems. This initiative would hopefully bring in new eyes, ears, and ideas.
Just a few more highlights from 2024 that are important:
Whippany River Flood Remediation Strike Force in Total = $3.2 Million Dollars
HT has a seat on The Morris County Chamber of Commerce Advisory Board
Hanover Township currently has an officer on The Morris County League of Municipalities Executive Board and HT will have one of the six positions on a League of Municipalities subcommittee to better understand and fight some of the very unfair state mandates of the fair share housing laws.
A few highlights from the Hanover Township Wellness Campaign
End of Year Report 2024 Mayor’s Wellness
Activities
Heart Healthy Luncheon 75 participants
Valentine’s Day Dinner Dance 200 participants
Let’s Improve Balance 36 participants
Introduction to Acupuncture 19 participants
Distracted & Impaired Driving 110 participants
Healthy Sleeping Workshop 27 participants
Mindfulness Meditation 32 participants
Hope One Narcan Training 29 participants
Kicking It Together 31 participants
At the Volunteer’s Recognition Reception, 3 awards were given on behalf of the Hanover Township Committee and Mayors Wellness Campaign:
Lifetime Achievement Award: Howie Olsen
Community Star Award: Raymond Burkhardt
Community Star Award: Margaret Wainscott
Hanover Township Designated: Healthy Town to Watch
To conclude my comments for tonight, I want to Thank all of the Hanover Township residents for the honor of serving on your Governing Body.
I also want to use this platform to officially announce I will be seeking re-election for the Hanover Township Committee this upcoming Spring of 2025. I hope I have earned your trust and support in my tenure; I will have much more information available shortly. Thank you again for your continued support and partnership.
Ronald Francioli cautiously discussed also running for re-election this Spring of 2025. For the record, Ron has been an incredible public servant, and we are actively encouraging Ron to run for one more term in 2025. Hopefully Ron will have an official statement shortly.
Thank you very much again for placing your confidence and trust in me to serve on your Township Committee and God please continue to Bless Hanover Township.
