Mulch Meltdown at Red Bank Council Meeting

It began with a request for mulch and ended with the slamming of the mayor’s gavel, the only thing that could silence the back and forth shouting and barb tossing between the board and a taxpayer Tuesday night.

Following a Red Bank Council meeting devoid of controversy, Fair Haven resident and borough landlord Cindy Burnham approached the microphone at council chambers and began her request for mulch to put at the base of a Maple Cove sign by asking why council members Ed Zipprich and Juanita Lewis didn’t respond to her emails.

The situation only devolved from there.

Burnham, a fixture at Red Bank council meetings and a member of the group that persuaded the borough to hold on to about an acre of waterfront property located near the library and convert it to open space with public water access, said she didn’t believe a half-truck of mulch was too much to ask for considering all of the work volunteers put in to maintaining the property.

According to the council, the Friends of Maple Cove, the group that lobbied the borough to hold on to the land, are supposed to maintain the property, and that includes its landscaping. Burnham said that’s simply not true, despite near-unanimous assertion from the council that it is.

With Burnham taking on each more than willing council member in rounds of he said, she said, what should have been a simple request turned in to a nasty argument with the council pointing to agreements it claims have been made and the tough economy and Burnham singling out a part time employee for receiving benefits the borough pays for.

Council President Arthur Murphy challenged Burnham’s claim about who is responsible for Maple Cove’s landscaping and if Red Bank has any responsibility in it whatsoever.

“There isn’t a person up here who doesn’t appreciate what you’ve done,” he said. “But, you have a funny way of twisting things and I’m not afraid of saying it.”

Burnham wondered out loud how much a half-truck of mulch could cost as Zipprich said it was a cost the borough didn’t want to assume. At one point she looked back to the audience at Department of Public Works Director Gary Watson for support, staring wide-eyed and mouthing "come on" as he said he didn’t know how much that amount of mulch would cost Red Bank.

Commercially, mulch goes for about $30 per square yard, though municipalities often get the stuff for free or for a nominal fee by mulching debris themselves or getting it from nearby municipalities or the county.

With antagonism coming from both sides, Mayor Pasquale Menna, the voice of calm and reassurance on the board, ended the bickering with a few swift knocks of his gavel.

Burnham and the council aren’t strangers. A regular at meetings, Burnham is also part of a group trying to convince Red Bank to set aside land for use as a community garden, something this group has promised to maintain without assistance from the borough. Burnham, along with Tinton Falls resident Bill Meyer, is suing the council over the sale of the borough’s more than 100-year-old former hall on Monmouth Street.

Continued discussion about mulch was apparently put off for the night following the dispute.