By Allison Perrine
RED BANK – Community members young and old again rallied together Saturday afternoon, urging the borough to fix its senior center on Shrewsbury Avenue which has sat in disrepair since 2019.
Organized by passionate residents, the second “Fix It Now Rally” held March 13 featured various speakers who shared their reasons for wanting the center to be repaired and reopened as soon as possible. Organizers tried to keep the event nonpolitical despite the presence of council members Kate Triggiano, Hazim Yassin, Kathy Horgan, Erik Yngstrom, Michael Ballard and Mayor Pasquale ‘Pat’ Menna.
“Won’t each of us, God willing, someday be old? There’s a moral responsibility to demonstrate by action, not words,” said borough resident Patty Whyte during the rally. “We may be healthy and financially comfortable today but 2020 has shown us that neither of those are guaranteed tomorrow…I call upon the citizens of Red Bank and members of the council to stand up and do what’s right, and do not allow your legacy to reflect that we failed to make a moral commitment to the needs of our elders.”
The first Fix It Now Rally was held in January and was spearheaded by resident Tiffany Harris, a former outreach worker for the senior center. She felt passionate about the cause after learning the status of the building she once worked in, which suffered a burst pipe in 2019 that uncovered a series of other costly issues within its walls. It has remained unoccupied since then. In the meantime, the council has arranged a three-year lease at Trinity Episcopal Church for seniors.
“This building was specifically for the seniors and we want to keep it for the seniors. We don’t want any kind of partnerships; this is their building and we shouldn’t push our seniors aside,” Harris told The Two River Times March 13. “We just want council to listen to the residents, listen to the people. I think they have their own personal agenda of what they want to do, of what they have in mind and they’re totally still ignoring what the residents are saying.”
Harris is not alone in wanting to keep the center at 80 Shrewsbury Ave.; it has been a main concern of many residents who have fought about the issue who say seniors deserve the waterfront spot overlooking the Navesink River.
“Please don’t replace this wonderful building. They have taken care of so many people. And these are people – these are your mothers and fathers, these are your sisters, these are your aunts and uncles. Don’t throw them out in some…place up the street,” said 76-year Red Bank resident Marion Quinn.
She praised the facility for its service to many in town, but especially to her late sister. While living in Quinn’s home, her sister would visit the senior center daily and would socialize, eat, play games and win prizes, Quinn said.
“She had a life there and I could go to work knowing that she was safe and she was respected and she was treated very well,” said Quinn. “I’m very grateful to the senior citizens and please, I’m begging you, don’t let them tear this place down.”
Resident and former borough employee Memone Crystian provided some background on waterfront properties during her speech at the rally. She said historically, waterfront homes were occupied by immigrants, minorities or poor communities due to the complications they could bring – flooding, insects and potential hazards such as drowning.
But things began to change with the advancement of technology and government-backed flood insurance. And decades ago, Red Bank “capitalized” on this and purchased the senior center property on Shrewsbury Avenue and, with the support of residents, she hopes it will stay that way for years to come.
“Why would anyone want to take that from our senior citizens now?” asked Crystian. “Can you imagine how much they could make on this property – what sort of ratable this would become?”
She added that with the help of others who are speaking out, the narrative has changed and the borough now says the property is not for sale.
“You spoke louder and louder, and some began listening and some acquiesced. Some have not, but they are listening,” Crystian said. “It’s important that this community does not stop speaking until your elected officials listen to what you’re saying. And if they don’t listen, protect the quality of your life and vote them out.”
Cindy Burnham, a former Red Bank councilwoman, read an open letter she and other “concerned Red Bank residents” wrote to the planning board sharing their feelings about the senior center having been “deliberately left in disrepair” for over two years “despite repeated calls for its repair from the public, elected officials and the seniors themselves.”
“In our opinion, our borough administrator and four members of the borough council have deliberately stalled and intentionally delayed fixing our senior center so that it can be part of the redevelopment agency’s vision for our town,” she read. “The business administrator and council supporters have left the center abandoned. We call this demolition by neglect and we are beyond furious that, though the council is supposed to represent the residents, those four members are instead doing the bidding of outside interests.”
Resident and school board member Suzanne Viscomi told The Two River Times that she wants the borough to operate on a nonpartisan form of government rather than the existing partisan government currently ruled by Democrats. In the past, she has run for council as a Republican and as an Independent but has not succeeded.
“I’m on the school board and the reason why it works, the nonpartisan, is I don’t have to agree with everyone; we all have the same goal and mission. On the council, everybody has their own agenda – even if it’s one party,” said Viscomi.
She added that she plans to run for council this year as an Independent. Currently, four Democrats are in the running – newcomers Bruce Maida and LeRoi Jones are running against incumbents Triggiano and Yassin. Should Maida and Jones lose the Democratic ticket to Triggiano and Yassin, Viscomi said her candidacy as an Independent would be “the only way” to potentially stop the incumbents – whom she has not been shy to criticize – from winning reelection.
After the rally, councilman Ballard posted on Facebook, reflecting on “what has become” of the senior center since 2019. He wondered if the building became “a vanity project for some in Red Bank” and “an opportunity to build a monument to oneself on the taxpayer’s dime.”
“The obvious action when there is damage to one’s home is to fix it and move on. But that is not what has happened,” Ballard wrote. “Unfortunately, the will of the community and desires of our seniors to just fix the senior center and let them back in their home has fallen on the deaf ears of the majority of council members. The ultimate cost of remaking the Red Bank Senior Center into a monument of aggrandizement for some will be a burden on taxpayers far and away greater than simply repairing it ever would have cost.”
For more articles about this issue, see the Jan. 21, Feb. 18 and March 11, 2021 editions of The Two River Times.
The article originally appeared in the March 18 – 24, 2021 print edition of The Two River Times.
