Ridge Traffic Task Force Planned for Officials

Rather than meeting last week, township and school officials have decided to get together on Wednesday to set the parameters of a joint task force to try to address a long-term solution to Ridge's traffic jams on school mornings.

At the first meeting, the representatives from the school and from the township expect to hash out when they will meet, and set parameters for the task force, Susan McGowan, president of the said at Monday night's board meeting.

McGowan said the school representatives will include herself, Schools Superintendent Nick Markarian, and board member William Koch, who has headed the board's facilities committee.

But she said the task force is not intended to include members of the public.

However, she said the task force would be looking at ways to solicit input from the community.

As he had before at last month's school board meeting and Township Committee meeting, South Finley resident Bill Connors asked the school board, and then the Township Committee, to create a promised task force that would include residents from South Finley, neighbors of the high school, and also Homestead Village residents affected by the rerouting of Ridge school buses to a walkway behind the Cedar Hill Elementary School.

"There should be a community voice," Connors said. He also asked what had happened to a task force with residents that had been discussed earlier this year.

Connors did not get a direct answer to his questions.

Connors told the school board in September, "I will be at every meeting."