Thrifty at a High Price - High Bridge, NJ

I have had a long standing love/hate relationship with a local thrift shop -- I love a good bargain, I love that needy people get food, however I hate that my children are abused by store volunteers on a consistent basis. Today was no exception. One of my children has a lingering cough. She is only 3. As soon as she coughed the cashier began to berate my parenting skills, saying things like, "that child should not be out" and "what kind of parent brings a sick child out". She said these things in front of my other children and other customers, quite loudly. On our way out she would not ring me up at the register and made herself busy. I approached her anyway and told her it was none of her business and that she was out of line to make a judgement call on my parenting. She told me that she could say anything she wants, and quite clearly, she does. So I put my children in our vehicle car which was parked right outside the window and went back in. I explained to them that when I came in the manager of the store had her dog, Barney or Bailey, in the store and also had it running around in the back where the food for the food pantry is stored and served to needy people and that it was clearly a health code violation. I told her I was respectful and did not say anything and minded my own business, only to have them get in my business, again. I asked her why when one woman was blowing her nose, and another customer coughing, at that VERY MOMENT, why they were not picked on, or their judgement questioned. I tried to reason with them that it is February and most people have the sniffles or coughs to no avail. These people seem to have a problem with children. Anyone else have a less than harmonious shopping experience in High Bridge?

A Crappy Thing to Do

Dogs can do some pretty crappy things, people even more so. Every morning I walk my dog up Route 513, passed the elementary school. Every morning I pass the High Bridge Reformed Church. At some point they found it necessary to put a sign on the church lawn that says "no dogs on grass". The strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street is littered with poop. There are apparently several dog walkers that see fit to just allow their dogs to go there and quite frankly its disgusting and irresponsible. If you are doing this as a sign of disrespect because some church at some time in your life offended you or harmed you, uh, get over it. The elderly lady in her Sunday best that accidently stepped in your doggie pile has no idea about it. Nobody likes to clean up crap, especially someone else's crap, but guess what? When you signed up for dog ownership this is one of the things that comes along with it. Cleaning up after your dog is not as difficult as it sounds. I personally save all kinds of plastic bags that enter my house (no not plastic shopping bags, we use cloth), like those from frozen veggies, fresh produce, bread, etc. When you dog goes, just put the bag over your hand like a glove, grab the poop and pull the bag inside out over the poop. There you go. Now you can put it in your garbage can.

Trashy Ideas about the Garbage

If you are a resident you already know that the borough has mandated a sticker system to attempt to restrict reduce the amount of garbage produced by residents. I have noticed several shortcomings of this program.

First and foremost, how on earth does this help the borough acheive the state mandate? I cannot see how the implementation of a tax increase, not so cleverly disguised as a sticker system, can acheive the mandate to reduce municipal garbage by 50%. I must say, however, that I agree that those who throw out more should pay more. I also believe that those who use the schools should pay for the schools.

The instructions disseminated by the borough are unclear. Are stickers per bag? Are stickers per pound? Are stickers per gallon? If I put out one 16 gallon bag per week (which I did last week) why am I penalized by being forced to use a sticker intended for a 32 gallon bag? I was looking for things to throw out so I would get my moneys worth out of my sticker. And I still only threw out half of what I was entitled to. Perhaps I should have used half a sticker on that bag. Anyhow, this totally did not decrease the amount I threw out.

I am left wondering why are the businesses on Main Street putting out far more garbage than most residents and appear to be exempt from the sticker program? Should commercial garbage even be picked up with municipal garbage?

Honestly, these simplistic stickers can easily be reproduced on any home computer by your average third grader. This is probably whythe same such sticker system failed ten years ago. Residents paying such high property taxes really resent being treated like a third grader that needs a hall pass to use the bathroom.

Sadly, the borough's response, as usual, is to restrict. There are many other things the borough can do to reduce municipal waste.

- The borough could hold a free4all in the Commons to recycle/rehome usable items and build community.

- The borough could educate residents about recycling.

- The borough could educate residents about purchasing less packaging with their merchandise.

- The borough could educate residents about composting.

But hey, something good comes out of everything, right? I walk past Borough Hall every morning and for the first time EVER I saw recycling put out in front of Borough Hall on Friday.