As long as the school roofs are leaking and as long as our streets still flood and the potholes continue to turn into ditches in our roads I can never justify voting yes to spend one tax payer penny on artificial turf fields.

Great point by Mr. B. When you have leaking roofs in a school that old you better start checking for mold because it's there. When the storm grates get clogged with debris they make the flooding even worse and we know what does to potholes.
We need a better effort with the leafing this fall.
We still have many roads in abysmal shape. We have problems that far surpass the need for artificial turf and the HFTC ramming it down everyone's throat is self serving.
They may have raised 800 thousand for the initial installation but the tax payers will be on the hook for hidden expenses and future bond payments that residents will be paying for long after some of these people leave town. In fact, if you look at their brochure you'll see that some of its members don't even live in Haddonfield.
With 800 thousand they could put natural turf on the high school that would look like Lincoln Financial or Citizen's Bank park for the next 10 years and be bond free. That would be a patriotic contribution to our town on its 300 anniversary.
On another note, there's not one person in town who believes Steve Weinstein's 15 million assessment because it's an institutional. Or 12.2 million for that matter.
It was rated at 6 to 8 million at the peak of the market and if memory serves, it was an institutional back then too. How much taxpayer money did he spend to come up with that quote?

There certainly seems to be a stunning lack of clarity among the officials pushing this through. If the Borough were a business, they wouldn't dare to be so uninformed about from whence the funds will appear.
Oh, but we already know. Us.

Ahhhh, the democratic machine . . . .

Stephen Weinstein, Esquire, is:
1. School Board President,
2. married to Karin Elkis who is Senator Menendez' state director
3. member of the same Florio law firm as -------> Freeloader Director Louis Cappelli, Jr. -

But SURELY politics has NOTHING to do with this overpaid deal.

It completely makes sense that a SCHOOL BOARD should buy a 19 acre property.

No politically connected lawyer, engineering firm or other machine contributor could benefit from this in ANY WAY!

Ha ha ha ha hah!!

ROTFLOL

BOE bond counsel is Phillip Norcross.

Brian Kelly---Turf donors are contributing $500K, not $800K for the stadium field. The other $350K for Anniversary Field is from taxpayers via a commissioners' resolution at a meeting without public notice of agenda. Likewise another $150K of taxpayer money from the BOE via resolution in August for the stadium turf. Taxpayers will pay for maintenance, disposal and replacement when turf wears out in 8-10 years. And insurance. And loads of other overruns and extras. And, maybe, a half million for a new track too, to replace the 4-year-old, failing track?

Thanks for the correction Taxpayer. What a lot of people don't realize is all the added costs that go with turf. Lodi, California had to pay 39,000 dollars for special chairs that won't damage turf when they hold their graduations.
Dodge City, Kansas paid 26 grand for plastic polymer flooring to protect turf from foot traffic. The list is endless with costs like these. What I can't get an answer on is what happens for the 4th of July fireworks?
As for the 500k raised by the HFTC, that's still 6 years of lush green grass for the football field if they use it for that. When we looked at pictures from the historical society of the field in past years it wasn't perfect but it was in pretty darn good shape and it was that way when I went to school, back in the days when taxes were reasonable.
Walk from goalpost to goalpost and you'll see the field is almost all dirt. That's called neglect by design.
The turf is so unpopular they'll have to pull it from the Bancroft referendum. It'll never pass with it. The HFTC is already figuring another way to push turf on the taxpayers of Haddonfield. We know Bancroft is worth about 6 million. The assessment reveals the environmental baggage that comes with it. The problems with turf, its ground up tire infill and chemicals used to treat it and the bancroft problem don't pose a happy picture for Hopkin's Pond.

Bond counsel for BOE is Phillip Norcross?! Got to love the Camden County political machine.....we are getting a front row seat right here in beautiful, bucolic Haddonfield! I've asked this question for months....who's making $$$ off of this deal. I guess the real question is "who isn't making $$$ off of this deal.! Is it really true that some of the turf proponents aren't even H-field residents? Gee, this just keeps getting better and better. I understand that they had a table set up at Back To School night to push their agenda. Talk about a captive audience....no Seniors in that group, I'm sure. Any word yet on the October 18 meeting or is the Civic Assn. still dragging their heels? Guess we'll hear about location and time on October 17.

i see my comments were deleted. thanks patch.