WESTWOOD—The Township of Washington did not take the Borough of Westwood up on its offer to enter a shared services agreement for the borough’s recreation programs for this summer, but the invitation is open for fall and beyond.
Meanwhile, the borough says it’s been forced to withdraw the in-borough discount on user fees for youth coming in from the township, ending a tradition of more than a decade.
On May 18, Westwood’s governing body passed a resolution that effectively “adds” $25 to the per-child cost, per program, for township residents taking advantage of borough recreation activities, putting them in the same category as every other town.
“Be it resolved that the mayor and council hereby direct the Recreation Department to charge Township of Washington residents the non-resident recreation fees,” the resolution says.
The measure passed unanimously. Member Robert Bicocchi was absent.
Member Chris Montana, who spearheaded the effort to get the Township of Washington to partner on a shared service agreement for youth recreation, said he came away from his outreach disappointed.
“We understand that the township’s resources in terms of their fields and infrastructure are limited, so we want to work with them,” he said.
He added, “If you’re getting to use all of these services for free, they’re probably not in any rush to create a shared service agreement. But our taxpayers can’t shoulder 100% of the costs to do that — it’s unfair.”
Prior to the resolution, Montana presented on his efforts, along with those of Recreation Department Director Gary Buchheister and Shared Service Committee Chair Beth Dell, to get buy-in from the Township of Washington on a three-year, $20,000 per year assessment to keep costs down for township residents while paying toward overhead.
Montana’s related correspondence with Township of Washington Mayor Peter Calamari, and township recreation leadership (which Pascack Press obtained by open records request) shows Westwood worked this spring to preserve the “courtesy” in-borough rate for the township, its partner in the Westwood Regional School District.
The township recreation superintendent is Dan Scudieri. Its recreation director is Eeamon Twomey. The department runs a popular lacrosse and a summer camp, and its website promotes school district and independent offerings, and carries the Westwood Recreation Department 2021 spring programs flyer.
Montana said that he reached out to Calamari and Scudieri by email on Feb. 16 and March 7, expressing “concerns relative to [the Township of Washington’s] use of borough fields and facilities through participation in programs run in or by the borough.”
Buccheister and Montana met with Calamari and Scudieri March 31.
The correspondence shows Montana making good-faith efforts to get traction on the idea with officials in the township.
After Montana sent his proposal on April 9 by email, Calamari responded that the township Recreation Advisory Board and governing body were reluctant to change the taxpayer base but were willing to discuss an agreement further with a larger audience.
On May 5, Montana wrote Calamari to say he was “disappointed to hear of your board and council’s reluctance. As it stands … 45% of total participants are township residents. In our meeting, you and Dan [Scudieri] agreed this is not reasonable and fair; additionally, from my perspective, it is not sustainable.”
Montana urged agreement the week of May 10 — prior to Westwood’s summer sport sign-ups and in mind of his council meeting schedule —so that township youth could benefit this summer.
Calamari then wrote to Montana on May 12 in part to say “I had a lot of emails from yesterday go into my spam folder.”
With no further progress, Montana showed that on May 17 he emailed Calamari “of our intention to recommend nonresident fees for summer ’21 and openness to continue shared services conversations for fall and beyond.”
He told his council on May 18, “Our shared service liaison Beth Dell, Gary Bucchiester, and I were available to meet with their council member, recreation board member and recreation director at any time.”
Significant participation by township families
In 2019–2020, Montana said 429 Westwood children and 367 township children were involved in the borough’s soccer, basketball, football, baseball and track and field programs.
At the same time, Westwood taxpayers paid for all field maintenance; custodial work at Westvale Park and the recreation center; and mowing, seeding, clay and application, irrigation, maintenance of the irrigation system, lighting and electrical cost and maintenance, and administration.
“The inequity occurs as a result of Westwood taxpayers footing 100% of the cost for field and facility costs,” Montana said.
“If someone wants to call and say we’re ready to meet with you, I’d be extremely happy to do so,” Montana told Pascack Press last week. “The shared service is embedded in our taxes and the entire community shares in that, so that’s why we felt that this was a reasonable direction to go in—and we still believe it’s a reasonable direction to go in.”
He said, “My opinion, and it was the opinion of the recreation director and the governing body as well, is that our taxpayers are footing the bill.”
And, he said, “It should be reasonable to us that the town would want to enter into a shared service agreement, especially if that town can’t reciprocate equal field time. I believe that Westwood has a greater inventory of usable parks and fields for these programs, thus township residents are utilizing our programs versus their own.”
Montana said he hopes to continue to “reduce barriers, including fees,” for Westwood programs to Township of Washington residents.
We connected with Calamari for this story, but then he did not follow up on our repeated requests to set a time for an interview.
Buchheister told Pascack Press on June 16, “I’ve been the recreation director for 13 years and the one that created the programs, and instituted — well, the governing body instituted — recognizing nonresidents have to pay an additional fee for our programs.”
He said, “Whether it’s Emerson, Harrington Park, River Vale, it doesn’t matter — now the township — anyone who’s a nonresident, they’ll pay the same exact rate.”
Buchhiester said that in 2018, the Township of Washington also did not agree to a shared service to offset its residents’ use of Westwood’s award-winning Forever Young over-55 program, which would have made it more widely available.
“Township people went to their council meeting, a bunch of people, remember? And they flat out rejected them as well. So we’re trying to be good neighbors — we have a full-service recreation department, and we’re trying to do the best we can, but once again, our priority is to the Westwood taxpayers,” he said.
The two communities share a Special Needs Activities Program and Teen Center, where there are no fee changes.
On June 14, Calamari posted on his official Facebook page about the end of the township’s spring season, lauding team wins.
He said in part, “I would like to take a moment this morning, after yet another long and difficult year to acknowledge our youth in the township… It was a heartwarming week and a great sense of community seeing our local baseball, softball and even our little kickball teams finish up their spring seasons with incredible achievements.”
— With John Snyder