Fairway: The Reviews Are In

After waiting in a long, long line, I finally got inside the Fairway Market in Paramus this morning.

Tough to navigate the aisles; you have to go up and down every aisle as they all come to dead-ends.

In the kosher departments, I bought boneless kosher for Passover chicken cutlets, $3.69 a pound for a family size pack; Shredded cheese, kosher for Passover, $1.99 for an 8 ounce bag.; Temp-Tee cream cheese, kosher for Passover, 99¢ for an 8 ounce tub.

I wanted to see if the introductory prices in Paramus were that much cheaper than Fairway's regular prices. I checked their online circulars for the Brooklyn and Long Island stores, and it seems their regular prices are just a few cents higher than the prices in Paramus this week: Long Island and Brooklyn both were $3.99 for the chicken, same price for the cream cheese. The silver-tip roast which was $5.99 a pound in Paramus is $6.99 on Long Island.

Does this mean that local kosher consumers will finally have some good news as it relates to prices? Will Glatt Express try to match Fairway's prices? (Note that G.E.'s chopped meat at $3.29 a pound for the family pack is still the lowest anywhere). Will somebody start a slanderous rumor about Rabbi Marmorstein's supervision, since he's not with the RCBC? Will the new kosher section at the Paramus Shop-Rite be able to compete? (their prices are already too high). Will Harold's, across the street, be able to survive? Will the new Whole Foods in Paramus try to cater to the kosher shopper? 

Stay tuned.

Self-Haters At It Again

This time it's Clifton.

The Herald News (that's the Record's sister newspaper in Passaic County) had this on Sunday's front page: TEMPLE PLAN IRKS SOME NEIGHBORS

Seems like the residents of a certain part of Clifton, near the Passaic border, don't want the orthodox to have a new synagogue in town.

The great excuses include this from a Mrs. Greenwald: "When they moved into this community, they knew that there was no facility here. I am not in favor of it. Number one, because it will change the tenor of the neighborhood." In other words, it means more of those darned orthodox jews moving in, and actually walking down the streets.

From a Mr. Goldberg: "It's not necessarily resident against resident. It's really nonresident against resident." That means, those orthodox jews aren't really residents. You know, they don't use our public schools, they don't attend the town concerts on Friday nights. They're not really residents. The fool should realize that since orthodox jews have to walk to their synagogues on Shabbat, it is ONLY residents of the neighborhood who want or need this shul.

Teaneck residents may feel free to substitute Barbara Toffler for Dennis Kirwan in the next paragraph:

Dennis Kirwan, Clifton's city planner, said he opposes the synagogue plan as it's proposed because if approved, the site would be used intensively in a residential zone, and because Dwasline Road lacks sidewalks.

NO SIDEWALKS! Jews would have to walk in the streets! Quick, call Peter Applebome at the New York Times so he can write an expose on how those nasty orthodox jews are ruining our town. We don't want it to become like Rockland County here! 

I wonder if Kirwan is also a business ethics consultant with absolutely no ethics of his own, just like our precious Barbara.

And just like our wonderful non-observant neighbors in Tenafly, who called in a Jewish lawyer to try and block the eruv, the self-haters in Clifton have called in attorney Ira Weiner, who states: "It's a very large building that's very close to the property lines and has insufficient parking by a large margin." (Note that the plans call for 35 parking spaces).

Ah, the parking argument again. Because the jews with the black hats drive to shul on Shabbat! Parking for what? When will people finally see that making an argument about parking when it relates to a synagogue is in and of itself an anti-semitic statement, especially when you know damned well that  people walk there (in the streets, because there are no sidewalks).

Here's my solution: Build it anyway. Then move the rabbi and his family into the building and call it a residence with a really big living room. Now try to fight that one, you bastards!

The Cellular Tree Off Route 4

With the new phone tower off Route 4 getting some media and blog coverage, I decided to take a look at how cellular coverage in the area differs among the major carriers.

The maps below were taken from the cellular carriers' websites.

The lighter areas are the areas with less than perfect service. The darker the shaded area, the better the service.

I could not copy the map on the MetroPCS website, but based on their map, their service in the area is not great.

T-Mobile Coverage (the lighter areas here ar parks, not poor coverage areas)

T-Mobile 3G Coverage (the light areas get only GPRS/Edge coverage)

Sprint Coverage

Nextel Coverage

Verizon Coverage

Verizon 3G Coverage

AT&T 3G Coverage

AT&T Coverage

Keep The Cuts Coming!

While the rest of the world has been struggling with the recession, our local government is finally catching up.

Here in Teaneck, this is what we have so far in the school system: 

More than a dozen teaching positions would be eliminated under the preliminary $93.9 million 2009-10 budget adopted by the school board Tuesday. The spending plan calls for cutting only five elementary teachers' jobs, however, rather than the 13 job cuts that had originally been proposed. Other proposed reductions include the high school's cross-country program, several middle and high school teachers, and other staff and program cuts.

The original proposal was to cut 13 teachers. Now we're told only 5 teachers will be cut. Why? Cut the other 8!

We spend more per student in Teaneck than all but three or four other districts in the entire state of New Jersey. Enough already! Half the kids in town don't even attend public schools, yet we have a budget over 90 million dollars.

We're told the tax levy will be 3% higher than last year. Why? People have less, homes are worth less; we should decrease the budget! We're dropping cross country at the high school. Big deal. How about dropping basketball, football, soccer and baseball. When you have no money, you keep the basics and drop the fat. Since when do sports qualify as the three R's?

On the township side:

70% of the town's budget is for salaries and wages, pensions, health care, disability, workers' compensation and other benefits.

Are we all nuts? Why do we even have a paid fire department when almost all other towns make do with volunteers. Remember, these are the same firefighters that are responsible for killing the Seidenfeld children in our town three years ago.

As for the five cops who would be laid off: Why don't we apportion taxes to pay the police based on crime rates in the areas where the cops are needed. Raise taxes on the folks in the northeast part of town and on FDU students. Leave the rest of us alone!