8/15/18 Council Meeting

By: Joseph L. Kuchie

SOUTH AMBOY – Several South Amboy residents attended last Wednesday’s city council meeting to express their concerns about the recent increase of rats in and around the city.

Residents alleged that rats have been discovered all over town, including in the roads and yards of many residential areas. Resident Barbara Pasternack claims that the abandoned property near her home is where the rats are coming from, and that she has killed six rats in her yard thus far.

“The rats are running rampant around here, I know we killed six in our backyard,” Pasternack said. “Not only is it disgusting, it’s a health hazard, it’s a safety hazard.” 

“The house that is abandoned on my block has been abandoned for three years,” she continued. “Nobody has done anything… I know we’re responsible for our property but what is the city doing with their property? We pay taxes and quite frankly I haven’t seen anything done with our tax money that really benefits us and I want to know what’s going to happen.”

“We are aware that there are reports of rats in the city here and there,” Business Administrator Glenn Skarzynski replied. “I take issue with calling it rampant…I’m not disagreeing with the fact that there are sightings and as we receive each complaint I’ve got Jay Elliot [from code enforcement] and Lee [Lloyd] our health officer working in concert to go to the places, cite the responsible parties, compel them in municipal court to effect a cleanup.”

“It’s a situation we take very seriously,” he added. “Tonight, on first reading the council introduced an abandoned property ordinance which would give us a little bit of a better mechanism to follow up and identify some of these delinquent property owners…that’s a mechanism that we’re putting in place in response not only to the rodent issue but other issues with regard to the properties.”

Resident Ken Feely explained that he too had seen rats near his home, both running across Barkalow Street and in his backyard. He too thought the rats were nesting in an unkept property a few doors down from his home, and he was concerned that the kids in town were at risk of getting bit.

“I’ve watched several of these [rats] come running across my street the other day and yeah, I’ve got them in my backyard and it just caught me by surprise last week,” Feely said. “Do I want them? No. Is my backyard pristine? Yes. It has to be the house a couple doors down from us.”

“The big key is I saw them in the park…that house is right next to the park,” he continued. “Your words just now were ‘we’ll take care of the properties, we’ll find out what the problem is, and we’ll take care of the properties. If one kid, which there’s always kids in there, gets bitten from this I’m going to tell you right now you’re going to hear holy hell from people in this town and I’m going to be honest with you I’ll be one of them.”

Business Administrator Skarzynski pledged to walk the trouble areas that residents presented in hopes of bringing an end to the problem.

“I assure you without having to be directed by the governing body we will bring everything the city has to bare to get this situation under control, and that responsibility will fall directly on me, “ Skarzynski said. “I’m the paid professional that they employee to handle problems like this and we will make sure that it gets handled.”

Council Vice President Christine Noble ran the council meeting as Council President Mickey Gross was unable to attend. All other council members were in attendance.

The next city council meeting will be held on September 19th at 7:00 p.m.