Petition for Reimbursement of Sidewalk Repair Costs to Montclair Township Residents

The sidewalks of Montclair are well established as public property under New Jersey law, and yet Montclair residents have been simultaneously slapped en masse with violation notices for collectively hundreds of thousands of dollars of repair work for property that does not even belong to us. This is unfair, and we the undersigned feel the Township should pay their fair share, reimburse residents who were unfairly expected to foot the bill for what in truth amounts to a town-wide public works project, and have the Township do its part and take responsibility for funding the repair of public sidewalks in Montclair going forward, rather than shifting this burden inappropriately onto individuals, residents, and tax payers by the hundreds.

The recent adoption and enforcement of Ordinance O-25-05 has been carried out in an extremely draconian and poorly handled manner. Instead of citing the most egregious violations first so as to actually prioritize the needs of those who use mobility aid devices, everything from the smallest, most imperceptible hair’s breadth of sidewalk imperfection requiring careful study to even notice (things that would never cause trouble for a person with a mobility aid device) have been cited simultaneously along with actual sidewalk problems that are genuinely in need of repair. This has resulted not only in unnecessary costs for residents whose sidewalks were not even a problem, but in entire blocks being rendered un-walkable all throughout town, as residents scurry to repair their sidewalks before the deadline (an unbelievably narrow window of only 45 days in the original wave of citation issues), causing widespread inconvenience to the entire town.

We call for reimbursement of funds spent by residents in repairing any and all public sidewalk property, and for the Township to officially adopt a policy of taking responsibility for the cost of sidewalk repair going forward, as the sidewalks of Montclair are public property, and it is unfair—and even legally questionable—to dump the financing of this degree of public works project expense onto the residents and voters of Montclair.