Editor’s note: For more than five years, the Township of Washington has worked to replace its DPW headquarters, which was vacated and ultimately razed under state order due to longstanding soil contamination beneath the former building at Town Hall. Since 2019, township officials — including Mayor Peter Calamari — have explored multiple locations, including intermunicipal partnerships and a proposal near the Paramus border at the former Charlie Brown’s restaurant. Each proved unsuitable or met strong neighborhood pushback.
With the township largely built out and municipal land scarce, finding temporary and long-term space for DPW operations has remained a recurring challenge and forms the backdrop to today’s debate over the Bethany Community Center site. The back lot will accommodate roughly 12 to 18 months of DPW equipment storage and light operations while the township rebuilds its DPW at town hall, and residents in the quiet neighborhood most affected have raised — and vow to to press — a list of reasonable concerns.
We’ve covered this process every step of the way. More specifically, staff writer Michael Olohan has covered it every step of the way. Here is his take, unvarnished, as a close observer of this continually unfolding — and often very familiar — discussion that shapes life in the Township of Washington. With echoes of the township’s firehouse/ambulance headquarters project guiding him, this is the first in a series of pieces Mike looks forward to bringing us, offering added context on the Pascack Valley.
Reflections on another municipal construction project… four years ago
BY MICHAEL OLOHAN, PASCACK PRESS
Readers sometimes ask us about earlier stories as Editor John Snyder and I have been covering local news here for nearly a decade each. Some of those stories provide context for issues resurfacing in the township today. This occasional feature revisits those moments and updates them where possible.
We’ve been following the Township’s temporary 18-month lease of a 1.25-acre lot behind Bethany Community Center since early October, most recently with the council’s Dec. 2 approval of the $104,400 lease after a second public hearing. Much of the lease discussion took place in closed session prior to the Oct. 6 vote, and residents learned of the plan only once the township had already settled on using the Bethany lot for DPW vehicle and equipment storage during construction of the new DPW facility.
This story has unsettling parallels to another construction project controversy that dominated our news pages in 2021 and 2022 as a simple search of “Emergency Services Building” on our website reveals.
More than four years ago, on Oct. 24, 2021, we posted “Council punts on call to reform town projects,” which I wrote reporting on the Township Council’s decision to go with an informal agreement to refer future municipal construction projects to the Planning Board for review. Apparently, that was not followed with the recent construction activity at the Bethany Community Center lot, which was not vetted by the Planning Board.
That 2021 decision followed Councilman Steven Cascio’s call for additional review of municipal government projects, after strong community opposition from neighbors around the new, very large firehouse/ambulance headquarters that was being built on Washington Avenue.
Many neighbors said they were not properly notified about the new building, and were not allowed input into the decision to improve and expand the building. They also complained about not being properly notified by the township. Then-attorney Ken Poller said letters were sent by U.S. mail rather than certified mail to those living within 200 feet of the new building.
Poller let residents know then that the municipality did not need to adhere to the same planning/zoning rules that governed normal mortals, i.e. residents and developers. And so we have what happened with construction at the Bethany Community Center parking lot.
Recently, neighbors living on and near Woodfield Road, including some of the 37 nearby residents who were notified by certified mail, and even others who were visited by Administrator Mark DiCarlo, have claimed that they were not allowed input into any decision to locate a new DPW parking lot behind Bethany Center, which was distressing to neighbors.
We asked DiCarlo via email if the municipal construction (already completed!) at the Bethany site, including a new driveway, security fencing and gates and black site screening, was sent to the Planning Board for a courtesy review and public hearing but received no reply.
DiCarlo provided a 30-minute-plus reply to residents’ questions at the Dec. 2 hearing (see the meeting video) with no chance for residents to question his comments or answers. See the second video posted on the Dec. 2 meeting. Public comments were closed when DiCarlo read a long statement addressing residents’ questions and concerns.
We could not find any evidence that the Bethany DPW site improvements received a Planning Board courtesy review or opportunity for public comment before the board – two key criticisms about the town’s construction of the Emergency Services Building only four years ago.
Four years ago, we reported that, “Based on his research, Steven Cascio told the mayor and council that only two municipalities had ordinances that addressed local review of municipal projects and most nearby towns dealt with it informally via a local land use board review that included public notification and input,” our article noted.
Then-town attorney Poller (he retired in July 2024 and was replaced by Siobhan Spillane Bailey with a contract through this year) opposed efforts by certain council members to put an administrative review process in writing, which included a review by the Planning Board.
Poller said then that a town made to follow local planning and zoning requirements would be at a disadvantage, especially on controversial developments such as court-mandated affordable housing or a needed cellular tower.
Ironically, then-Councilor Michael DeSena, now council president, said one project that might come up was a proposed new DPW building. (After initially supporting the Bethany lease Oct. 6, DeSena voted against it twice after that.)
In 2021, the council did not specifically mention alternate sites or possible construction of parking for DPW vehicles. However, this was already an issue with the township agreeing in April 2021 to rent 35 spaces at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church for storage of extra DPW vehicles and equipment.
The township’s Bethany construction work, which cost taxpayers $57,700, and also done without a signed lease in place on the [not-for-profit] Bethany Church’s private property, also raises questions about why and how that work was allowed without a signed lease.
On Dec. 2, DiCarlo said a signed lease was not required by local officials to do work on the Bethany site due to a lease being approved by council resolution on Oct. 6.
DiCarlo noted, “I understand that the construction of the rear access driveway and installation of the fence was needed only if the Township entered into the lease agreement, however the lease agreement was not required for the work to be performed. There were properly funded capital ordinances in place to pay for these improvements. These funded ordinances were discussed and approved during open discussion, not closed session.”
He added, “Based on the unanimous passage of Resolution 25-327 and the unanimous introduction of the first reading of Ordinance 25-23, I reasonably and responsibly believed that the unchanged lease agreement ordinance would be passed unanimously by the council on Nov. 10, 2025. My responsibility as Township Administrator is to carry out the policies and implementations of the mayor and council. Our intentions to make site improvements were known to the governing body. Bethany Community Center approved of entering onto the property to make the site improvements prior to the commencement date of the agreement.”
His full statement can be found on the township website under “Dept. of Public Works Building Plan” at Administrator Response – 12.2.25
Moreover, the Bethany site must be returned to its prior condition after the township DPW finishes using it. What that will cost is unknown — and not yet disclosed — but could easily put total construction costs for the Bethany site near or over $100,000 of taxpayer funds. Another sticking point unaddressed by the mayor and council is what happens to extra vehicles and equipment after the 18-month lease expires.
Neighbors near the Emergency Services Building were adamant that they were not included in the town’s planning for a new emergency headquarters – similar to neighbors’ complaints about the new Woodfield Road access driveway for DPW’s temporary storage lot. As Yogi Berra infamously said, “It’s deja vu all over again.”
Whether a courtesy review by the Planning Board would have helped provide public information about the township’s DPW plans at Bethany — and offered an opportunity for early public input on the issue — is not clear but what is clear is that residents were not afforded that opportunity despite prior council intentions to allow for such reviews.
Michael Olohan covers town councils, school boards, and community news in the Pascack Valley and Northern Valley areas of eastern Bergen County, N.J. He can be reached at Olohan@thepressgroup.net.