Uninformed decision hurt taxpayers in East Brunswick

At the May 3 East Brunswick Township Council meeting, Frank Coury stated that the council acted as though it was subservient to the mayor. He cited instances that gave the impression that the members of the council had expressed no thoughts that would be indicative of some review of the issue at hand.

One such case cited by Mr. Coury was at a Feb. 8, 1999 council meeting when a township employee stated that unless East Brunswick had a new police training facility, the police would not be qualified to handle firearms. This statement was based on the belief that the state Legislature had mandated a new method of training police officers in the handling of firearms. The mayor and council at that meeting decided to look into building a new training facility.

At the next council meeting, Mr. Coury stated that he had called the state Legislative Services Commission and learned that no such mandate was in effect. Township officials foolishly speculated that the new facility would attract police officers throughout the state for training, since this would be the only facility meeting the new state mandate.

Their haste and failure to review the existing facts led the mayor and council to build the facility at a cost of $1.4 million and a yearly expense of $44,000 in interest on the borrowed money. As a taxpayer, I would gladly spend $25,000 a year for training rather than spend $1.4 million plus additional costs for maintenance and interest for a white elephant.

I, for one, believe that in this case no one bothered to review the facts before making a decision. This sort of action by so-called intelligent council members and supporting staff leads me to believe that someone was calling the shots. Unfortunately, the shots missed the mark, and we, the taxpayers, were hit.

Councilman Donald Klemp and Mayor William Neary were members of the council at that time, and I wonder if they would extend the courtesy of explaining why they supported the building of this unnecessary facility.

Danny Carbone

East Brunswick