CHALLENGERS MAINTAIN COMMITMENT TO OPEN SPACE AS GANZ AND CAAN WAFFLE

Debate Sees Ganz Siding With Developers Again

Fair Lawn, NJ - It is obvious following last Thursday's council debate that Mayor David Ganz has no intention of preserving critical parcels of land in the borough, say Republican Challengers Jeanne Baratta and Ed Trawinski

The challengers say Ganz waffled on his support for preserving Daly, and Hayward fields and Archery Plaza.

"David Ganz is pro-development, there is no question about it," said Trawinski. "He talks about the expense of preserving open space when he should be addressing the cost of the development that he favors."

Baratta and Trawinski reiterated their promise to preserve all three tracts and to prevent development on the Topps Cleaners site after pollution remediation is completed.

"We want what the people want and they want those tracts preserved for open space and recreation. Period. End of story." said Baratta. "We will not support any plan to develop them and add to the congestion and overbuilding problems suffered by Fair Lawn residents."

The challengers said they would appropriate money to purchase and preserve open space from a combination of sources including Bergen County's Open Space trust fund. They noted again that Ganz refused to apply to the county fund by the September 30 deadline.

"David Ganz's refusal to tap in to the county fund that Fair Lawn residents pay in to speaks volumes about his lack of commitment to open space," said Trawinski.

"Mayor Ganz is a hypocrite. He says he is supportive of open space, but fails to take any action to acquire it. Then he hires planners who want to develop fields that everyone else in towns wants preserved," added Trawinski, the former mayor.

Besides the county open space trust fund, Trawinski and Baratta say there are state and private sources of funding that will allow the borough to acquire open space without impacting local taxpayers.

Trawinski said that by refinancing the borough's recreation center through a competitive bid process, instead of the back room deal carved out by Ganz - the borough could free up money to go toward open space acquisition.

"David Ganz wants to have it both ways, He says he favors preserving open space but then says it is too expensive to stop development," said Baratta. "We believe that the cost of development - the cost of added services, education and traffic - is far more costly to the town than acquiring open space."