The year 2014 was one of new ideas and events in Cherry Hill
The township and school district bother unveiled new features to their website. Cherry Hill received its designation as a “Healthy Town” for the first time. The township even got a new board game based on it, called Cherry Hill Opoly.
Not all the new things were good. The township cancelled its annual Fourth of July fireworks to the disappointment of many residents. The Ellisburg post office also ended up in a new, much smaller home for much of the year, operating in a trailer near the Playdrome bowling alley.
There are also some people still waiting for new things. Numerous residents expressed their displeasure of the aging athletic facilities at Cherry Hill schools. Cherry Hill’s teachers are also still waiting for the approval of a new contract.
Before we jump ahead into a new year, let’s take a look back at Cherry Hill’s biggest stories from 2014.
Cherry Hill hosts the Maccabi Games
Thousands of Jewish athletes from across the United States and from as far away as Great Britain and Israel converged on Cherry Hill from Aug. 10 through Aug. 15 for the 2014 JCC Maccabi Games. Cherry Hill hosted the games for the first time since 1999.
Prior to the event, the community had the task of finding volunteers. Volunteers were needed to house athletes, staff the events and more.
Rob Kiewe, director for the 2014 games, said the volunteer effort was massive.
“It takes a village to pull something off like this,” he said.
One of the most impactful parts of the games was families from around the area being able to host athletes from all over the world.
One of these families was the Magaziners from Cherry Hill who hosted a group of athletes from Orange County, Calif.
“We wanted to have an opportunity to open up our home and our hearts and showcase our community,” Suzanne Magaziner said. “We have delegations from all over the world here.”
Kiewe said the host family aspect is one of the best parts of the Maccabi Games.
“Some of the relationships that are built between these athletes and these host families, that’s what it’s all about,” Kiewe said.
Athletes gave back to the local community during their visit. One service project took place at Cherry Hill East, where track and table tennis athletes work with the Burlington County affiliate of Habitat for Humanity to make welcome home posters for families moving into newly built homes.
“A lot of these kids are from different states, different countries, so they might not know what Habitat for Humanity does, so they’re going to talk about what they do for the community,” said Melissa Blau, a volunteer for the Katz JCC.
Cherry Hill teachers’ contract
The previous contract between the Cherry Hill Board of Education and the Cherry Hill Education Association expired on June 30. The teachers have spent the last six months working without a contract.
While there have been no hostilities from either side this year, a group of teachers decided to make their voices heard during the board of education’s November meeting.
“Our decision was to be positive,” CHEA president Martin Sharofksy said. “This is not an adversarial negotiation. It has not been at all. We respect the board of education, and they’ve shown us the respect that goes along with it, but I believe very strongly they need to know who we’re talking about.”
Many of the teachers praised their fellow colleagues work and described the love they had for teaching and the children in Cherry Hill.
Sharofksy said many residents didn’t realize the teachers were working without a contract. He felt it was best to make the community aware.
“Parents should ask and parents should know, because a lot of the community doesn’t know that we’re working without a contract, and I really believe they need to know,” he said.
The two sides met with a mediator for the first time on Dec. 15, but did not reach an agreement. Negotiations will continue in January.
Revitalization project announced
Cherry Hill announced plans to upgrade its gateways into the township on Routes 38 and 70 with the passage of several resolutions in November. The resolutions allowed the planning board to investigate whether four properties qualify as areas in need of redevelopment.
Three of the four properties are currently home to motels. The first area is a block of motels along Route 38 that includes the Hillside Inn, Feather Nest Inn and Days Inn. The second area is the location of Inn of the Dove and the former Baker Lanes building on Cuthbert Boulevard. The third area is the location of America’s Best Value Inn and the former Temple Emanuel synagogue along Route 70. The final area is the former Saunders Publishing complex on Hampton Road.
“For years now, these areas have been home to low-end motels and old vacant industrial buildings,” Mayor Chuck Cahn said. “It’s time we take the necessary steps to rejuvenate these gateways to Cherry Hill and transform them into more dynamic places to live and work.”
The planning board will continue to conduct its investigation in early 2015. There is no timeline on when the investigation will be completed.
Fourth of July fireworks cancelled
A Cherry Hill summer tradition ended in 2014 as the township elected to cancel its annual July 4 fireworks, previously held at the Cherry Hill West football stadium.
The township said the decision was made due to safety concerns. After township officials met with emergency personnel, they expressed concerns of the safety of spectators if there was an emergency situation.
“We really were not confident to quickly and effectively respond to an emergency,” township director of communications Bridget Palmer said. “Anytime you have that concentration of people in a limited amount of space, there is the possibility that something could go wrong.”
The township examined moving the display to another location, but felt the harm outweighed the benefits.
Many resident expressed their displeasure toward the township cancelling the event. Erin Breck suggested the township should hold a second fireworks show if crowding was an issue.
“If it was so popular, why didn’t they have two of them?” she asked.
Many residents were forced to go elsewhere for fireworks. Megan Alayo said her family went to Collingswood instead, but they were disappointed in the experience.
”It wasn’t that good,” she said. “It was just too chaotic.”
Residents upset about Cherry Hill schools’ sports facilities
Richard Stern, a parent and booster for the Cherry Hill East football team, spoke at the board of education’s public hearing on the 2014–15 budget in April, expressing his disappointment for the lack of improvements to Cherry Hill East’s football field. The budget included $175,000 to fix the visiting team bleachers at Cherry Hill West, but no upgrades at Cherry Hill East.
The board chose to make upgrades at Cherry Hill West due to safety concerns.
“This is a safety issue,” board member Elliott Roth said. “They cannot be used.”
In a July board meeting, more parents expressed their displeasure toward the facilities.
“It’s pathetic what’s at East,” resident Mark Solden said. “There’s no lighting so they can’t play night games. They don’t have enough bleachers. Our team didn’t have a bench last year.”
Resident Mark Lochbihler said there were safety issues beyond the bleachers at Cherry Hill West’s football field, describing the school’s tennis courts as a “lawsuit waiting to happen.”
“We have to warn the other schools not to run off the sides of the court because they’ll break their feet,” Lochbihler said.
A group of field hockey parents from Cherry Hill East and West said there were major problems with their fields. They felt the field hockey fields lagged severely behind other schools around the area.
“(Athletics are) not a priority,” Linda Goldberg said. “It’s embarrassing.”
“All of the other teams have turf,” Doris Kenniff said.
To take a closer look at the athletic facilities, district and school board officials took a tour with members of a newly formed athletics committee. The committee consists of principals, the athletic director, coaches and parents.
“It was very important to see the facilities in question with the athletics committee,” board member Seth Klukoff said.
Ellisburg post office
Residents in Cherry Hill’s 08002 zip code have been using a small trailer next to the Playdrome bowling alley as their main post office for much of 2014.
The former Ellisburg post office lost its former home in the Ellisburg Shopping Center in April when the shopping center’s owner, Federal Realty Investment Trust, did not extend its lease.
For seven months, Cherry Hill council granted temporary use permits to allow the post office to operate in a small trailer near its former location. In the meantime, the postal service conducted a search for a new location. They ultimately decided on a shopping center at the corner of Kings Highway and Chapel Avenue.
“We’re currently in negotiations with the landlord for a lease,” said Richard Hancock, a real estate specialist for the postal service. “There’s also the design and construction of the space. These things take time.”
The Ellisburg post office will continue to operate out of its temporary trailer in early 2015 until a lease is finalized at its new location.
Cherry Hill named “Healthy Town”
The township received a designation no other municipality had ever received, as it was designated as a “Healthy Town.” The New Jersey Mayors Wellness Campaign gave the designation to Cherry Hill in March.
Much of the credit to the designation went to Mayor Chuck Cahn’s wellness campaign, which was launched during Cahn’s first term in office in 2012.
“The whole goal of the campaign was to really educate the public that healthy living doesn’t have to be a grand gesture,” township director of communications Bridget Palmer said.
Cherry Hill received the designation after establishing programs in four different categories: youth in motion, seniors in motion, employers in motion and community in motion.
“We have hundreds and hundreds of programs for the year,” Palmer said. “We took inventory of that and really highlighted senior programs, children’s programs and highlighted them with a mayor’s wellness heart.”
The township unveiled its “Healthy Town” banner and held an aerobics class on the front lawn of Town Hall in July.
School district increases sustainability
With the township making huge improvements in sustainability in previous years, it was the school district’s turn in 2014.
The district unveiled a sustainability plan to the board of education during its May meeting. The district teamed with Sustainable Cherry Hill to create the plan.
“The group got together in large and small groups and crafted the goals and actions and results from that information into the plan,” Sustainable Cherry Hill president Lori Braunstein said.
The plan didn’t go into specific programs, but stated the district will look at using natural resources better, creating more green spaces on district property and adding more sustainability education in the classroom.
The students at Woodcrest Elementary School got into the sustainability act in April when they received a $2,914 grant from Recyclebank to beautify a Peaceful Garden in front of the building. The garden had been created in 2009 and was vandalized shortly after.
The school decided to rebuild the garden with the grant in hopes of using it as an educational tool.
“We decided we wanted to have a respectful and responsible garden,” Woodcrest principal Beth Ann Kob said.
The school formed a green team during the fundraising process. Kob said the students have shown a greater willingness to maintain the garden.
Cherry Hill gets tech-savvy
Both the township and school district made multiple technological upgrades in 2014.
Cherry Hill Public Schools launched a free mobile app on Feb. 14 for any parents, students or community members to download.
The app brought a lot of online features from the Cherry Hill Schools’ website into a single app. Some of the features included viewing a student’s grades, school calendars, a payment system for lunches and emergency notifications.
“Our goal was to make it easy for staff, parents and students to access the information they need while on the go,” director of support operation Don Bart said.
Within the first week of release, more than 1,000 people downloaded the app. The app is available on iTunes and Google Play. It can be downloaded to an iPhone, iPad, Kindle or Android device.
Meanwhile, residents in Cherry Hill gained the ability to pay their taxes and sewer bills online. The township launched an online payment system Feb. 3.
“We just wanted to make it easier for our residents to pay their taxes or sewer bills from home,” Palmer said.
The biggest addition to the new system was the ability for residents to pay their taxes or bills with a credit or debit card.
“We don’t accept credit or debit at the tax window,” Palmer said. “The township would absorb that 2.9 percent fee. So it’s an effort to mitigate those fees.”
The new system also eliminated the amount of time it takes to process a payment. Payments can now be applied as soon as the next business day.
The police department also made upgrades as it announced the launch of an electronic ticketing system in January. The system was installed with the hopes of increasing the efficiency in which tickets were processed through the police department.
“The key is that it’s more efficient,” Cherry Hill Police Chief William Monaghan said. “We want to increase efficiency so we can improve our normal delivery of service for effect.”
Reaction from police officers was positive as the new system significantly cut down on the length of time traffic stops took.
“It’s going to reduce the time that officers are on a car stop,” Monaghan said. “The officers like it because they’re not having to handwrite each summons individually.”
The new system cost about $100,000 and was the latest technological upgrade for the department. The police upgraded its computer systems and increased its social media presence in 2013.
Cherry Hill Opoly
Cherry Hill Township found itself taking over the Monopoly board in 2014.
The Cherry Hill Education Foundation created a game called Cherry Hill Opoly as a fundraiser for Cherry Hill Public Schools. CHEF partnered with the school district and the township to enlist businesses to sponsor spaces on the board.
“The mayor actually started to invite the iconic businesses from around town,” CHEF president Eleanor Strofman said.
The game featured tokens harkening to well-known township programs such as Dancing with the Cherry Hill Stars and the Mayor’s Wellness Program and spaces featuring longtime Cherry Hill businesses such as Ponzio’s and the Cherry Hill Mall.
Proceeds from the game went toward grant requests for improvements to classrooms across the Cherry Hill school district. Teachers submit requests to CHEF each year.
“Most of them are revolved around technology,” Strofman said.
Cherry Hill Opoly can be purchased at www.cherryhilleducationfoundation.com.
Remembering Joyce Walker, Lewis Katz and N. John Amato
Cherry Hill lost three very influential figures in the township in 2014 with the deaths of former councilwoman Joyce Walker, prominent community member and philanthropist Lewis Katz and councilman N. John Amato.
Walker died on Dec. 28, 2013, at the age of 61 after battling cancer. She was chair of the Board of Fire Commissioners at her passing and was co-chair of the Cherry Hill Democratic Party.
One of the many things Walker was known for was the role she played in the construction of the new Cherry Hill Public Library.
“There was a period where the future of the new Cherry Hill Library was in question,” Council president David Fleisher said. “She was a leader in making sure that the project got finished.”
As a tribute, the library named its multicultural room after Walker during a ceremony in the fall.
In June, residents in Cherry Hill received a shock as Katz, 72, was killed after his private jet crashed in Massachusetts.
Community members described the incredible impact Katz had on the Jewish community in South Jersey. Untold stories of how he helped others in need came to light in the week following his passing.
“His whole mission was to help people who were less fortunate,” said Jennifer Dubrow-Weiss, CEO of the Jewish Federation of South Jersey. “He was so blessed to give back to the community because that’s what drove him.”
In addition to his work with the Jewish Federation of South Jersey, Katz helped facilitate Congregation Beth El’s move from its old Cherry Hill facility to its new campus in Voorhees.
“He helped to build our education wing,” Dubrow said. “We moved our synagogue 10 to 12 years later. He was involved in every aspect.”
Cherry Hill lost Amato, its longest-tenured councilman, on the evening of Sept. 18. Amato died from cancer at the age of 82.
Amato’s impact on the community was felt far and wide. Former township officials spoke of how he would visit Ponzio’s every morning to talk with fellow diners and meet with residents.
“He would tell people, ‘You can always see me at my seat at the counter at Ponzio’s,’” former Cherry Hill Mayor Susan Bass Levin said. “That was his special office.”
Many people in Cherry Hill knew Amato better as Santa Claus, a role he played for many years at the Cherry Hill Mall and township events. Bass Levin remembers having breakfast with Amato at Ponzio’s one day when a father and his two daughters approached them.
“Just in back of (the father) were two adorable little girls,” Bass Levin said. “He whispers to me, ‘They met him at a church when he was Santa Claus.’ So they sat down with John and he talked to these two little girls.”
Brian Bauerle appointed to council
Cherry Hill Township welcomed 39-year-old Brian Bauerle to council in October. Bauerle was selected to fill the seat previously held by Amato during a special meeting of council.
Bauerle, a former member of the township planning board, was selected in part because of his dedication to township organizations and willingness to communicate with residents. Cahn said Bauerle has many of the same traits Amato had.
Bauerle said he looked up to Amato as an inspiration.
“I just want to carry on John Amato’s legacy,” he said. “He did everything with Cherry Hill first in mind. He did it with dignity, with pride, and to be here tonight, in the chambers named after him, is a very special thing.”
