Boro will name community center task force
Mayor will appoint members of task force by Jan. 1
BY MELISSA KARSH Staff Writer
Arecent shooting in the borough brought the issue of a community center for Red Bank youths to the forefront as the mayor announced Dec. 5 the formation of a community center task force.

Mayor Pasquale Menna said the task force members would be announced prior to Jan. 1, and would include council members, community activists and other stakeholders in the project "to implement the vision, goal and practical planning of a community center."

"I think the time has come that it is important for us to earnestly look as a community [at] what is lacking in our [child] rearing process," said Menna at the Dec. 5 council meeting.

He said residents need to pull together as a community to give a focus to some of the young people in the neighborhood, especially those that lack a close-knit family circle.

The issue of a community center in Red Bank had been discussed at length at previous council meetings and the project seemed to be in limbo after the Parks and Recreation Committee made a recommendation to the council to partner with the Boys and Girls Club of Monmouth County, a nonprofit organization based in Asbury Park. That recommendation, Councilman John Curley, liaison to the Parks and Recreation Committee, noted at the Dec. 5 council meeting, is still on the table.

"A lot of residents feel like either council or the police don't care what's actually going on," said Patti Whyte, Westside Avenue, at the council meeting.

Whyte, chairwoman of the Human Relations Advisory Committee, said residents of Montgomery Terrace, the location of a Nov. 26 shooting that left two young men critically injured, had come to a committee meeting to voice their concerns about the safety of the neighborhood.

Whyte added, "You have people who don't feel safe in our community, our home."

Menna addressed the shooting at the beginning of the meeting along with steps he had previously discussed with the police department to address residents' safety concerns including heightened security in the borough and housing complex and community policing.

Menna also said that once the task force begins discussions it would take about 30 to 60 days to put a plan of action in place.

"Assuming they are going to go for the building that's already there it shouldn't be too hard to implement. I think we really have to have a comprehensive plan, objective, funding and also what are we going to do once we open the doors, it's got to be viable," said Menna, referring to the muchdiscussed Count Basie Achievement Center Building, located on the corner of Bridge Avenue and Drs. James Parker Boulevard.

Local community center advocate David Prown, Hillside Place, had previously championed the Count Basie building, which the borough owns, as an instant, inexpensive location for a community center.

"Red Bank has a lot of work ... right now," said Linda Clarke, River Street. "I'm looking at the situation now where the community center has been an issue. I remember when William Poku stood here and talked about the shooting that took place in Newark right when that happened and it's like, wow, a few months later look at what's happening right here in Red Bank. Look what's happening with some of the youth that have nowhere to turn."

Clarke, who runs the Count the Children program in the borough, also addressed Councilwoman Sharon Lee's estimate that it would take five years to have a community center in the borough.

"If we're projecting five years, … and we can build these condos and we can build these townhomes but we can't take time out for these kids, we're wasting our time because a lot of people are looking at dollar signs and they are not looking at these lives. It's the attitude that also has to change in Red Bank," said Clarke.

She said that there is also a lot of frustration in Red Bank, where people who live in the borough cannot seem to get jobs in the borough.

"I'm convinced we are doing everything possible to [keep] our community a good community," said Menna.

He said the task force would work with people from the finance department; the parks and recreation department, the schools, churches and community groups to put a community center plan into action.

"It's not going to be a complicated issue to discuss from a task force view. I think that the time is now. I do think that we do have the initiative and also the need. There has been a foundation laid we just really need to iron out some of the finances and some of the structures," said Councilman Michael DuPont at the council meeting.