October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and at the Oct. 4 Moorestown council meeting, Deputy Mayor Sue Mammarella revealed that in the course of a year, she has been elected to council, retired and survived breast cancer.
“It was actually last October where I figured out that there was something wrong, and I just encourage any woman listening out there (to) please make sure you’re paying attention, and if you see something call the doc and catch it as early as you can,” she said.
Following Mammarella’s meeting update, Mayor Nicole Gillespie announced that she and Township Manager Kevin Aberant have discussed when in person meetings can resume.
“We both think that there’s a good chance that our next meeting, Oct. 25, will be in person, but we’re not going to decide that, and I’ll let Kevin talk a little bit more about that in his update,” Gillespie noted. “But I just want to say that we are looking at that.”
“We do want to get back to in person as soon as we can do so safely and appropriately,” the mayor added. “We’re monitoring stats and we will be making a decision. We will announce that, if we are going to go back in person, we will announce that at least a week in advance.”
Next on the meeting agenda were first readings of proposed ordinances for work on two water tanks in Moorestown that will allow for improvements on the Westfield Road and the North Church Street tanks. According to Aberant and the agenda, the proposed ordinance for the tank on Westfield is for preliminary engineering and design expenses for painting, changes on the valving at the base of the tank, and a vent on top that will prevent the tank from having a vacuum and potentially crushing itself.
The ordinance for a tank on North Church Street is for power washing and for the same changes recommended for the tank on Westfield Road.
“It’s actually a very complicated process to paint a water tank,” Aberant explained. “There’s very specific tolerances and specifications for the paint that goes on it, and this is painting (on) both the outside of the tank and the inside of the tank.”
“There’s a significant amount of engineering that goes into that.”
Council motioned for both proposed bond ordinances to be approved on first reading and set a public hearing date for Oct. 25 at 7 p.m.
Later in the Oct. 4 meeting, council discussed the water-main break that happened on Oct. 2 on Lenola Road. According to Aberant, about 14 feet of the pipe needed to be changed.
“Public Works did a great job; they literally worked all night,” Aberant noted. “They got on scene at about 11 p.m., started digging it out, and it was an entire section of about 12 feet of pipe. They did not finish until sometime Sunday morning.”
Aberant also discussed a return to in person sessions before closing comments from council at the meeting.
“My suggestion is, let’s continue to monitor the situation,” he said. “And I can speak to the mayor in advance of the Oct. 25 meeting, and we can continue to monitor and determine if it’s appropriate to return to in person meetings,” he said.
