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What Is That Mountain on Edgeboro Road?

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A group of about a dozen visitors stands on bare graded ground at the Edgeboro Road landfill beside two white shuttle buses, under a blue sky with scattered clouds. Overlaid title card reads: Eyes on EB, Part 1 of 4, What is that mountain on Edgeboro Road?

Thousands of us drive past it every day. It started as a hole in the ground in 1954, it is actually two landfills stacked on top of each other, and the public has even been invited to tour it by bus.

Part 1 of a four-part Eyes on EB series.

Come up Edgeboro Road toward the river and you’ll see it long before you get there.

There’s a hill out in that direction. A big one — green, graded, oddly smooth-sided — sitting in a part of town that is otherwise as flat as a parking lot. River lowlands, marsh grass, warehouses, truck terminals. And then this.

Most of us pass it without a second thought. We know the one-sentence answer: it’s the landfill. And then we keep driving.

But that one-sentence answer turns out to be almost comically incomplete. What’s out there isn’t a hill, and it isn’t really a landfill either. It’s an engineered structure, built up in measured layers across seven decades, sitting on top of an older landfill that closed a long time ago. It’s wrapped in monitoring equipment, wired with hundreds of gas wells, and piped under the Raritan River. And it began, of all things, as a hole in the ground.

So what exactly are we looking at?

I found out mostly by accident.

Years ago I signed up for one of the public open houses at the landfill on Edgeboro Road. You get on a bus, they drive you through the facility, somebody talks the whole way.

I want to be honest about my expectations. I figured I’d be polite for forty minutes and then go get lunch.

Instead I found the whole thing genuinely fascinating, and remarkably thorough. But the part that stuck with me wasn’t the machinery or the scale of the place. It was the people who work there.

They were extraordinarily professional. And my clear personal impression — and I want to be careful to call it that, because it’s an impression and not a measurement — was that these were people who actually cared about protecting the environment. Not in a corporate-brochure way. In a “let me explain to you why this matters” way.

They talked about why proper waste handling matters. Why different materials belong in different places. That inappropriate material does sometimes show up at the gate, occasionally concealed on purpose, and that there’s a whole process for catching it. They seemed a little bit annoyed about that last part, which I found reassuring.

That was one afternoon, one person’s impression, a while ago now. It is not evidence about how the facility operates. But it is the reason I eventually went looking for the documents — and the documents turned out to be far more interesting than I expected.

What this series is, and what this part isn’t

This is Part 1 of a four-part Eyes on EB series about the Edgeboro Road landfill.

There is too much here for one article. Genuinely. We spent a long time in state permits, engineering reports, legislative hearing transcripts, county budgets and municipal bond documents, and the story kept getting bigger.

So here’s the plan. This installment answers the simplest question: what exactly is that thing? What are you looking at when you come up Edgeboro Road and there’s a landscape feature where a landscape feature has no business being?

Part 2 will explain how it got so big — and the answer is not the one I assumed. Part 3 covers the part of the story that surprised me most: one Edgeboro landfill genuinely did close, on a legal deadline, and a second one was built on top of it. Part 4 brings it to the present — the disputes, the money, and the question of what happens when the mountain stops growing.

This part is deliberately not trying to tell the whole history. It’s trying to make the rest of it make sense.

It started as a hole

Here’s the detail I like best, and it’s the one that reframes everything.

Before there was a mountain, there was a pit.

A 1987 engineering evaluation prepared for Middlesex County and the Middlesex County Utilities Authority puts it plainly: “Prior to 1954, a sand and gravel quarry owned by the Herbert Sand Company had been operating on a portion of this site.” The same report records that “The Edgeboro landfill has been operating as a sanitary landfill since 1954.”

So the mound began as somebody digging material out of the ground. Then, starting in 1954, material started going back in.

For its first quarter-century, it was a private operation. On January 12, 1979, Edgeboro Disposal, Inc. received a Certificate of Approval from the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection to operate as a sanitary landfill.

What happened after that is Part 2’s story.

What you’re actually looking at

The active facility is the Middlesex County Landfill, at 53 Edgeboro Road, owned and operated by the Middlesex County Utilities Authority — the MCUA, the same authority that runs the regional wastewater treatment plant in Sayreville.

Some numbers, using only figures our sources actually support:

The site is 315 acres. That number is remarkably stable — the 1987 evaluation gives the site as 315 acres, and MCUA gave the same total in a 2024 public information session. What’s changed is how much of it is under waste. In 1987 the breakdown was 233 acres of designated fill area, 57 acres of leachate treatment ponds and 25 acres of scales and receiving area. In 2024 MCUA described 247 acres of landfill contained within those 315 acres, with the remainder serving as environmental buffer.

Height is where people get tripped up, including us, so let’s be precise about two different things at once.

The permitted ceiling has been raised four times over the site’s life — but not all four belong to the same landfill. The older, private landfill was permitted to 87 feet, later revised to roughly 110 feet. The current county landfill was permitted to 165 feet in 2000, and to its present 220 feet in 2016.

And every one of those figures is above mean sea level — not height above the ground you’re standing on. The site sits in the Raritan and South River lowlands, so the two measures are closer here than they’d be elsewhere, but they are not the same thing, and no source we found gives a height above grade. Anyone who tells you the mound is “220 feet tall” is doing arithmetic the record doesn’t support.

By MCUA’s own account it takes in about 500,000 tons of waste a year, serving all 25 Middlesex County municipalities and over 800,000 residents, six days a week. In January 2026 the authority reported an average of 252 trucks and 1,714 tons a day.

Two landfills, not one

This is the thing that most changes how you see the site, and it’s worth slowing down for.

What looks like one mound is really two landfills from two different eras, stacked.

Underneath is the older, privately owned landfill — the one that operated from 1954. It is closed and capped. On top of and beside it is the active MCUA landfill, which opened on February 5, 1992, after six months of construction.

The federal government has a term for this arrangement. In a 2010 news release, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency described “this piggyback landfill design, in which MCUA landfill space is constructed on top of the capped Edgeboro landfill.”

Locally, people had already coined their own word for it. At a New Jersey Senate Environment Committee hearing held in South River in May 1993, a legislator testified that “Edgeboro Landfill has the distinction of being the nation’s only double-decker landfill.” We should flag that fairly: that was a legislator’s assertion in testimony, not a verified fact, and we haven’t been able to confirm the “nation’s only” part. But “double-decker” is what people around here were calling it thirty-three years ago, and it’s a good description of what’s physically there.

One warning that will save you confusion for the rest of the series: the name doesn’t tell you which landfill anyone means. In state regulation and in MCUA’s own municipal disposal contracts, the active county facility is also called “the Edgeboro Landfill.” When you see the name in a document, check the date and the described owner.

How and why the old one closed and the new one opened is Part 3. It is a better story than “they said it would close and it didn’t,” which is the version I half-expected to find and which turns out not to be what happened.

How you actually build a landfill

Modern landfills are not holes you throw things into. They’re engineered containers, built in stages, and the specifications are written into the state permit.

Working from the Solid Waste Facility Permit issued by NJDEP for the county landfill, here’s roughly what’s under the waste, from the bottom up:

  • three feet of compacted clay, or an approved soil-bentonite equivalent
  • a 60-mil high-density polyethylene secondary liner
  • 18 inches of sand containing perforated pipes — this is the leak detection layer, whose entire job is to catch anything that gets through the liner above it
  • an 80-mil HDPE primary liner
  • 18 inches of sand containing larger perforated pipes — the leachate collection layer

Leachate is simply the liquid that percolates through a landfill. The permit requires that the liquid sitting on the liner never exceed one foot deep, which is why the collection layer matters. At Edgeboro, collected leachate is pumped from three drainage areas into the MCUA trunk sewer and treated at the wastewater plant in Sayreville. It doesn’t go into a stream. It goes into the sewer system, like everything else.

The landfill opened in 1992 with three of these lined cells. By 2010 there were nine.

The daily rhythm

The permit gets specific about how filling actually happens, and reading it explains a lot about what you see from the road.

There can be no more than two working faces at a time — the exposed area where trucks are actually tipping. Each face is limited to 150 feet wide, or 15,000 square feet of exposed area. Waste gets compacted in two-foot layers. A day’s lift, including cover, can’t exceed 12 feet. The slope of the working face can’t be steeper than three feet horizontal for every one foot vertical.

Then there’s cover, which is the part I’d never thought about:

  • Six inches of material over all exposed waste by the end of every working day
  • Twelve inches on anything that will sit exposed longer than 24 hours

That’s why the mound looks like a graded earthwork rather than a dump. It’s covered at the end of every working day. Christine Sullivan, an environmental advocate who took the public tour in 2023 and wrote about it, put it simply: “The landfill is capped nightly.”

When an area is finished for good, it gets a final cap — six layers, including a textured 60-mil HDPE geomembrane, a sand drainage layer, filter fabric, and a foot of vegetative soil on top. That’s what turns a working face into the green slope you see from Route 18.

What gets checked at the gate

This is the part the employees told me about on that bus, and it’s also the part I was most able to verify afterward — which is exactly why I’m separating the two.

The state permit requires the operator to maintain a program for detecting and preventing disposal of hazardous and other unauthorized waste. Its specific requirements include:

  • “random inspection of incoming loads”, with inspections recorded
  • “training of facility personnel to recognize regulated hazardous waste”
  • any truck suspected of hauling hazardous waste is “stopped and inspected”
  • “continuous visual monitoring of the discharged waste” — someone is watching what comes out of the truck
  • suspect material may not be returned to whoever sent it; it must be segregated, stored securely, and NJDEP notified immediately through its Environmental Action Line
  • and the operator must record the name of the hauler suspected of delivering it

MCUA’s own public fact sheet adds that inspectors check for proper waste classification, out-of-county waste, recyclables and banned materials, and that certain industrial waste requires laboratory analysis and pre-approval before it can be brought in at all.

The permit’s list of what’s prohibited is its own kind of education: sewage sludge, bulk liquids and semi-liquids, septic tank clean-out waste, untreated regulated medical waste, hazardous waste, leaves, and anything designated as recyclable under the county recycling plan.

One clarification there, because it matters later in this series: that prohibition is on sewage sludge being buried as waste. Separately, and controversially, a sludge-derived product was for years used as cover material at Edgeboro under a state consent order — which is a different thing entirely, and which became the subject of a serious public fight. That’s Part 4.

None of that proves my impression of the people. It does confirm that the procedures they described to me are real, required, and written down — and that catching concealed material is part of the job, not a story told to visitors.

For what it’s worth, I’m not the only one who came away from that tour impressed. Sullivan, writing in June 2023 as co-chair of a group called Getting Past Plastics — an outside environmental advocate, unconnected to me and not employed by MCUA — described “the landfill’s staff of 30 (many with advanced degrees)” working six days a week, and called it “a highly professional tour.” Hers is an advocate’s opinion column rather than a piece of reporting, and its enthusiasm is her own. But she’s independent, she went, and she reached a similar conclusion.

Gas, wells and a pipeline under the river

Decomposing waste produces methane. A landfill this size produces a lot of it, and the gas has to be captured for safety, odour control and environmental protection.

By MCUA’s account there are roughly 350 gas wells in the mound, connected by piping, feeding a collection system. The gas travels about seven miles by pipeline — running under the Raritan River — to a cogeneration facility in Sayreville, where it generates up to 17 megawatts of electricity that powers the authority’s wastewater treatment plant. Some of the methane is also processed and sold as renewable biomethane.

Notably, the system collects gas from the active landfill and from a closed one. The old landfill underneath is still producing, and still connected.

Beyond the gas system, the permit requires an extensive monitoring regime:

  • quarterly methane surveys around the perimeter, checking for off-site gas migration
  • quarterly leachate sampling
  • quarterly inclinometer readings — instruments that measure whether the mound is moving
  • an annual topographic survey of the whole landfill
  • a minimum 150-foot setback and a 50-foot buffer zone from the toe of the slope, with that buffer dedicated as open space

MCUA reports 44 groundwater monitoring wells across the site.

Why the groundwater gets watched so closely

The geology under the mound explains a lot.

The 1987 evaluation describes the layers: decades of fill, then organic tidal marsh — silt, clay and peat — originally up to 35 feet thick and since “consolidated to a thickness of four to five feet by the weight of the overlying landfill.” The mound is slowly squeezing the marsh beneath it. Below that sits the Farrington Sand, part of an aquifer the report notes “is used extensively in Middlesex County as a source of groundwater.”

Then the twist. Public water-supply pumping in the region, which the report traces back to 1877, gradually reversed the natural direction of groundwater flow. Water that once drained toward the Raritan and South Rivers now moves inland — so the groundwater, in the engineers’ words, “appears to now transport any contamination towards” the well field doing the pumping. Whatever happens on this site doesn’t simply wash out to the river.

The same report found elevated readings in wells downgradient of the landfill. It listed six possible causes — among them the landfill, older waste outside the containment wall, an adjacent sanitary sewer, and the rivers themselves — and concluded that “The level of information available is insufficient to determine the exact source(s).”

It’s worth being precise about what those readings measured: organic loading, not toxic chemicals. A separate NJDEP memorandum from 1986, testing for priority pollutants, reported “no significant pollution in any of the well water tested.” Both results are in the record. Neither settles the question.

What came after the 1980s — including the odour disputes longtime residents remember vividly — is Part 4.

Birds, deer, and an open house

Here’s something I didn’t expect.

The landfill has a documented wildlife population. Sullivan’s 2023 account reports that the East Brunswick Environmental Commission identified 19 different bird species on the site, including falcons and ospreys nesting there, along with deer.

And that isn’t accidental. The state permit requires implementation of a Wildlife Mitigation and Landscaping Plan, prepared by the engineering firm Malcolm Pirnie in November 1989, to be carried out as sections of the landfill are closed and capped. The habitat is a permit condition with a design behind it, drafted before most of the current mound existed.

There’s one more thing on the property that surprises people: East Brunswick’s own recycling and composting operation is on the Edgeboro Road campus. The township runs a Class B and C recycling center there, redesignated by NJDEP in 2021. Some of what you put at the curb doesn’t just go past the landfill. It stops on the same site.

And some of this has been shown to the public firsthand. The tour I took wasn’t a one-off. MCUA has run public open houses periodically and has offered tours to school groups. For a Saturday morning in June 2026, the authority advertised a tour running about 40 minutes, billed as “an inside look at how the Middlesex County Landfill safely manages nearly 4 million pounds of waste every day,” with a new requirement that guests be age 7 or older.

That’s the authority’s own promotional material, so take the framing as theirs. But the tour is real, and worth taking if the chance comes around again. Forty minutes, and you’ll never drive past that mound the same way again.

What East Brunswick gets

One last number, because it’s the hinge into everything that follows.

East Brunswick is paid to host this. In its adopted 2026 budget, MCUA lists $4,537,000 in host community benefits to the Township of East Brunswick — money the town has been receiving in some form since 1985 under a 1985 state law providing host community benefits to municipalities where a solid waste facility is sited.

It’s a little more complicated than one line item, and the township books it in more than one place, which we’ll untangle in Part 4. But the round number people use — about $4.5 million a year — is close enough to be going on with.

Which raises a question worth holding onto: how did one township end up hosting the disposal site for all 25 municipalities in Middlesex County?

NEXT: PART 2 — How Edgeboro Got So Big

Here’s what I assumed before we started: that at some point East Brunswick, or a company operating here, made a decision to build a very large regional landfill.

That is not what the record shows.

In 1976 Edgeboro took in a few hundred thousand tons of waste a year. Ten years later it was taking millions. Somewhere in between, other landfills in Middlesex County stopped operating — one of them very suddenly — and enormous volumes of waste began arriving on Edgeboro Road, from places well beyond East Brunswick and, in a meaningful share, from beyond New Jersey entirely.

Middlesex County went to court to stop it.

Part 2 is the story of how that happened, who decided it, and why the mountain grew upward.

THE SERIES

  • PART 1 — What Is That Mountain on Edgeboro Road? — Current installment
  • PART 2 — How Edgeboro Got So Big — Coming soon
  • PART 3 — The Landfill That Actually Did Close — Coming soon
  • PART 4 — The Fights, the Money and What Happens When the Mountain Stops Growing — Coming soon

Eyes on EB builds its reporting from original records. This installment draws on the 1987 Edgeboro Landfill Evaluation prepared for Middlesex County and the MCUA; the NJDEP Solid Waste Facility Permit for the Middlesex County Landfill; NJDEP permit filings and public notices; MCUA budgets, public information materials and monthly reports; a 2010 U.S. EPA news release; the transcript of a 1993 New Jersey Senate Environment Committee hearing; and a 2023 first-person account of the public tour. Where our sources disagree, we’ve said so.

East Brunswick Approved a Lidl on Route 18 Four Years Ago. The Site Is Still an Empty Lot.

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Lidl Route 18 East Brunswick featured image

EAST BRUNSWICK, NJ — The lot at 651 Route 18 has been empty for years. The furniture store that stood there — Huffman Koos, and later Unclaimed Freight — was demolished after East Brunswick’s Planning Board approved a Lidl supermarket on the site in May 2022.

Four years on, nothing has been built.

In February, the Planning Board approved a revised plan for the same property, and the store East Brunswick is now going to get is considerably smaller than the one it signed off on the first time.

What changed

The 2022 approval was for a 31,042-square-foot grocery store with 155 parking spaces. The plan approved this year is for a 23,481-square-foot store with 109 spaces.

That is 7,561 square feet less — a 24 percent reduction. The new store is about three-quarters the size of the one originally approved, and there are 46 fewer parking spaces.

Alongside it, Lidl added something that was not in the 2022 plan: a 1,015-square-foot restaurant with a drive-through, on its own pad on the site. Even counting that addition, the total floor area is still about 6,500 square feet below what was approved four years ago.

The board approved the revised plan unanimously, 10 to 0, on Feb. 25, and formally adopted the written resolution documenting that approval on May 13.

Why the store shrank

This is not a company scaling back its plans for East Brunswick. It is a company changing its stores everywhere.

Asked at the hearing how the site compared with Lidl’s North Brunswick store, the applicant’s civil engineer, Alexander Lomei of Bohler Engineering, said the chain is “going through the process of bringing their buildings — they’re reducing the size of their buildings,” and that the older, larger design was “probably similar to the 30,000-square-foot building that was approved by this board a few years ago.”

Lidl’s attorney, Jennifer Mazawey, noted that the company’s Hazlet store runs about 34,000 square feet — “and that was what we were approved for here originally.”

Nobody knows what the drive-through will be

The 1,015-square-foot pad has no publicly identified tenant.

“We’re calling it a coffee shop,” Lomei told the board. “There’s still — they’re trying to sort out who the end tenant would be.” Elsewhere in the hearing, the applicant’s team said plainly that there was no tenant and no plan to sell the pad.

The restaurant should not be confused with the Raising Cane’s planned elsewhere on Route 18. Raising Cane’s was approved for the former Red Lobster property at 750 Route 18, a separate development from the Lidl site at 651 Route 18.

The Lidl property sits in the HC-2 highway commercial zone, which permits retail outright and conditionally permits restaurants with drive-throughs.

The township has been asking about the lot

The sharpest exchange of the night was not about square footage.

Joseph Criscuolo — East Brunswick’s business administrator, who also sits on the Planning Board — told Mazawey the site had become a problem. He described a letter about the fence being in disrepair, a tarp, unkempt landscaping, a pile of dirt and leftover asphalt, and said the township had raised it repeatedly.

“It’s not been once, it’s not been twice, it’s been many times since you’ve taken Huffman Koos down,” he said. “I was happy to see that building go, but we can’t have it become an eyesore.”

Then: “By this time, I really would have hoped that you’d have the store in operation.”

Criscuolo asked for direct contact and escalation numbers so the township would not have to chase a property manager, and said he would rather not issue a notice of violation and go to court. “Please just be a good neighbor and keep the site clean without us having to call you.”

Mazawey said she had passed earlier complaints on. “When it was brought to my attention, I did bring it to the folks at Lidl’s attention, and it was cleaned up fairly quickly at that point,” she said. “I recognize that may have been three or four contacts in.”

What the board granted

The revised plan needed five variances, most of them carried over from 2022. Lot coverage was approved at 80.4 percent where the ordinance permits 75 — though that is an improvement on the 84.9 percent allowed in 2022. Parking was approved at 109 spaces where 126 are required. The board also granted variances on the loading space dimensions, a side yard setback of 9.8 feet where 20 is required, and a parking and driveway setback of 2.5 feet from the side lot line, which is tighter than the 5 feet approved four years ago.

Still no date

No construction schedule or opening date was given at the hearing, and Lidl has not announced one. The board has not taken up the property since May.

For now, the approvals are in place, the plans are on file, and the lot is still empty.

In One Year, East Brunswick Council Members Cast Just One No Vote

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The empty curved dais of the East Brunswick Township Council chamber beneath the township seal, overlaid with the words "Just one “no” vote — a year of East Brunswick Council votes."

Eyes on EB reviewed every recorded vote the Township Council took over twelve months.

Across 25 East Brunswick Township Council meetings from Aug. 25, 2025 through Aug. 24, 2026, Eyes on EB identified 118 roll-call votes carrying a recorded vote mark in the official minutes. In those 118 votes, council members cast exactly one “No.”

That number is easy to over-read, so three things about it up front.

A single roll call is not a single decision. Much of what the Council enacts moves through a consent agenda, where one motion adopts a numbered range of resolutions at once: 22 such motions carried 337 resolutions during the year.

Not every departure from unanimity is a vote against something. Eleven recorded votes were not unanimous, but ten involved a member abstaining rather than opposing. An abstention is not a No.

And agreement says nothing by itself about whether a proposal was examined closely. A roll call records only where members landed when their names were called.

What the numbers show

This review counts each RECORDED VOTE OF COUNCIL table as one vote, and treats a vote as unanimous when every member who cast a Yes, No or Abstain voted Yes. On that basis, 107 of the 118 votes were unanimous — 90.7 percent.

Removing consent motions barely moves it: of the 96 non-consent roll calls, 85 were unanimous, or 88.5 percent.

Narrowing to substantive business — ordinances at either reading, resolutions set down for a separate vote, resolutions pulled off consent, and add-on resolutions — 61 of 68 were unanimous: 89.7 percent.

All 22 consent motions passed unanimously.

The one No vote

Councilman James Wendell cast the year’s only recorded No vote on July 27, 2026, against Ordinance 26-21, which would designate data centers a prohibited use in every commercial, business and industrial zoning district in the township. It was introduced 4–1.

The minutes record his reason: “Councilman Wendell expressed opposition and concerns to the ordinance. He stated that the definition of a data center is too general and needs to be refined.”

What followed is part of the same story. The hearing, first set for Aug. 10, was rescheduled to Aug. 24, and at that meeting Council President Dana Zimbicki moved from the floor to amend the definition — changing “primary use” to “principal use” to match the township’s land use code, and calling the original wording an error in the printed agenda. The amendment carried. Nobody from the public spoke. The amended ordinance was adopted 4–0, with Wendell voting yes and Council Vice President Dinesh Behal absent.

An objection was raised on the record, the language changed, and the member who objected voted for the result.

The other ten

The remaining non-unanimous votes were abstentions, and they are not evenly spread.

Zimbicki accounts for five, all on one subject: the ordinance fixing compensation for temporary, part-time and seasonal employees. She abstained at every stage — Ordinance 25-42 at its introduction on Nov. 10, 2025 and its second readings on Nov. 24 and Dec. 8, then the successor ordinance 26-02 at its introduction on Jan. 26, 2026 and its adoption on Feb. 9. Councilwoman Dana Winston recorded four abstentions and Behal one.

The minutes state no reason for any abstention in the period, and Eyes on EB is not supplying one. One plausible explanation — that a member abstained on minutes of a meeting they had missed — fits some but not others: Winston was present on Nov. 10 and abstained on adopting those minutes, and Behal was present on Dec. 8 and abstained on adopting those.

Ordinance 25-42 also produced the year’s only failed ordinance, though not because the Council rejected it. On Nov. 24, with Wendell and Winston absent and Zimbicki abstaining, it drew two yes votes and the minutes state it “was NOT adopted on second reading.” A New Jersey ordinance needs a majority of the full governing body, and two of five is not one. Fourteen days later, with all five present and Zimbicki again abstaining, it was adopted 4–0 — a difference of attendance, not of position.

The conflict rules are visible too. Winston recused herself from two ice arena concession resolutions on Dec. 22, 2025, and she and Behal both recused themselves from the award of that contract on Feb. 9, 2026, when Wendell disclosed that his son had previously worked for one of the bidders. The minutes place recused members in the “Absent” column rather than “Abstain,” so recusals appear nowhere in the vote tables.

What a consent agenda is

The consent agenda accounts for most of the Council’s output. It is a standard municipal device, not an East Brunswick invention: items considered routine are grouped and adopted by one motion. The agenda says they “are considered routine and non-controversial,” with no separate discussion “unless a Council Member so requests.”

During the year 337 resolutions moved through 22 motions — a median of 11 per meeting, and one bundle of 58 at the January reorganization. Four were pulled out for separate consideration: 1.2 percent.

Their contents are largely what the label suggests: property tax cancellations for disabled veterans, tax and utility refunds, lien redemptions, festival and fireworks permits, advisory board appointments, materials contracts and the bill list — not categories that ordinarily divide a council anywhere.

Unanimous does not mean silent

The most important qualifier in this data cuts against the simplest reading of it. The minutes record discussion before 64 of the 68 substantive votes — 94.1 percent. Whatever else these numbers show, they do not show a body that votes without talking first.

They also cannot show what happens away from the dais. Council members read packets, question the administrator and the township attorney, sit on committees and form views before a meeting starts. None of that appears in a roll call.

So the question the data raises is not whether the Council discusses things. It plainly does. The narrower question is how seldom that discussion ends with a member voting no in public.

One case where a unanimous vote was not the end

On Oct. 27, 2025, resident Zahid Mehmood of Tall Oaks Drive told the Council during public comment that Ordinance 25-36, creating a township chapter on “Drones and Unmanned Aircraft,” conflicted with federal law and “goes beyond federal and state regulations.” Later that evening the Council introduced it 5–0, with no council discussion recorded. Two days later Eyes on EB published a legal breakdown citing Singer v. City of Newton, subsequent FAA guidance and New Jersey’s drone statute. Our Nov. 12 reporting documented what followed: reader Robert Wasilewski brought the article to Jason Miklowcic, and both took it to Ryan Latourette, who engaged legal counsel and, by that account, got the issue to the township’s attorneys. None of that appears in any township record, and Eyes on EB does not claim its coverage alone stopped the ordinance.

What the record does show is that on Nov. 10 there was no second reading. Mayor Brad Cohen announced it in his report, saying members of the public “and some of us here in the township recognized that the ordinance as it was written was a little bit too broad,” and that the police department and the attorneys would look at redrafting it. “You will get that back when it’s redone,” he said. It has not come back: of 38 ordinances introduced during the year, 25-36 is the only one never scheduled for a second reading.

How this review was done

Eyes on EB reviewed the official minutes, agendas and packets, and EBTV videos for all 25 Council meetings between Aug. 25, 2025 and Aug. 24, 2026. The minutes contain 119 recorded-vote tables; 118 carry a vote mark, and the 119th is blank because the minutes state action was not taken.

Every set of minutes posted for the period is a scanned image with no searchable text, so they were read by optical character recognition. All eleven non-unanimous votes, the failed ordinance and the single No vote were then verified against the original page images.

Two meetings — March 9 and Aug. 24, 2026 — have no published minutes, and votes taken at them are not in the counts above. Transcripts for both contain no abstentions and no instance of a member’s name followed by “no,” but automatic captioning is not a signed record, and the Aug. 24 adoption of Ordinance 26-21 rests on the agenda and video for that reason. The March 9 minutes demonstrably exist — Resolution 26-116, adopted March 23, is titled “Resolution Adopting Meeting Minutes – March 9, 2026” — but have not been published with the rest.

One definition matters: the minutes sometimes call a result “a unanimous vote” when a member abstained or was absent. This review applied its own test consistently instead.

Eyes on EB welcomes corrections from the township or from any council member.

East Brunswick Banned Data Centers. Here’s What That Actually Means.

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The township now prohibits them in every commercial, business and industrial zone. No data center was ever proposed here — but two neighboring towns have already had the fight.

On Aug. 24, the East Brunswick Township Council voted 4–0 to ban data centers.

The vote took about ninety seconds. Nobody from the public spoke during the formal hearing itself — though Charlie Kratovil, central Jersey organizer for the advocacy group Food & Water Watch, voiced support for the prohibition during general public comment immediately after the hearing closed. If you were watching, you might reasonably have wondered what had just happened, and why a town with no data center proposal was banning something nobody had asked to build.

Here’s the plain-English version.

What the township actually banned

Ordinance 26-21 does two things. It adds a definition of “data center” to East Brunswick’s zoning code, and it lists data centers as a prohibited use in twenty separate zoning districts — effectively every commercial, business and industrial zone in town.

The definition is deliberately wide. It covers what most people picture — a warehouse full of servers — but the ordinance says it should be “construed broadly,” and specifically names hyperscale facilities, colocation facilities, cloud computing infrastructure, cryptocurrency mining operations and artificial intelligence processing facilities, “regardless of how such facility is labeled or described.”

It applies to buildings “characterized by large-scale or small-scale building footprints.” There is no minimum size, no server count, no electricity threshold. That breadth became the main point of disagreement on the council, and we’ll come back to it.

The ordinance takes effect 20 days after publication.

Why a town with no proposal is banning them

East Brunswick has no data center application, no pending inquiry, and — as council members noted in July — very little vacant land. Any data center here would have to replace something else.

But look one town over in either direction.

In New Brunswick, a 27,000-square-foot data center was proposed at 100 Jersey Avenue. The City Council rejected it unanimously on Feb. 18 after sustained public opposition.

In South Brunswick, a data center was approved in May 2025 on a 143-acre segment of the former Princeton Nurseries site. Residents later circulated a petition trying to stop it.

East Brunswick is now roughly the 36th New Jersey municipality to adopt a prohibition, according to the Climate Revolution Action Network. That count is disputed. Speaking at the same meeting, Food & Water Watch organizer Charlie Kratovil said East Brunswick was joining “more than 50” New Jersey communities. The two figures have not been reconciled, and we are not able to say which is correct. North Brunswick and Stafford Township passed bans the same night.

Council President Dana Zimbicki framed it in July as a holding action: “What we’re looking to do with this ordinance is to sort of put a pause on this until state regulations and legislation catches up.”

The part that shows up on your electric bill

This is why data centers became a New Jersey political issue rather than a zoning curiosity.

Electricity across the regional grid is bought through an annual auction. The price of guaranteeing future power supply has gone nearly vertical — from about $29 per megawatt-day two years ago to $329 for the year beginning this June. Analysts have attributed roughly 63% of one of those jumps to demand from data centers.

You already felt it. New Jersey electric rates rose about 20% on June 1, 2025 — roughly $20 a month on a typical bill. Rates are up about 55% since 2020. The state already hosts about 100 data centers.

Trenton has moved on this. Gov. Mikie Sherrill announced a statewide data center plan in May and signed an energy package in July that includes a law requiring large data centers to pay for their own power and grid infrastructure rather than spreading it across everyone’s bills. East Brunswick’s ordinance cites that work — and notes pointedly that the promised state help for municipalities “will take time to be implemented.”

That’s the argument for acting locally now rather than waiting.

What changed between July and August

Ordinance 26-21 was introduced on July 27. According to TAPinto East Brunswick, which covered that meeting, it passed introduction 4–1, with Councilman James Wendell voting no.

Wendell’s objection, as reported, wasn’t that data centers should be welcome. It was that the definition was too loose. He asked whether an office building, a computer company or an alarm-monitoring business with a lot of servers could get caught by it, and warned the wording “could expose the township to legal challenges.” He asked for a specialist to review it.

His words at the time: “I’m not saying not to do it. I’m saying that it needs to be much more tightly defined.”

Then something happened that’s easy to miss.

Before the final vote on Aug. 24, Zimbicki moved to amend the ordinance from the floor. The definition had described a facility used “primarily” for storing and processing data. The amendment changed that to “principal use,” to match the township’s land use code.

That sounds like housekeeping, and that is how Zimbicki presented it — the change was made “to match our land use codes,” had also been handled at the Planning Board, and the original wording was, she said, “just a mistake when it got printed on the agenda.” She did not offer it as an answer to Wendell. It may still bear on what he raised. When he asked in July whether an office building or a computer company could be swept in, Township Attorney Joseph Palombit answered that the prohibition reaches facilities whose primary purpose is housing digital infrastructure, and that the municipal complex would not qualify because its primary purpose is running the government. Our reading is that defining a data center by a building’s principal use points in the same direction — but that is our reading, not something the ordinance states. We have not established how “principal use” is defined in the township’s own land use code, and the breadth flagged earlier is unchanged: the definition still carries no minimum size, no server count and no electricity threshold.

Zimbicki said the wording had also been addressed at the Planning Board, and called the packet version “a mistake when it got printed on the agenda.”

Wendell voted yes on the amendment, and yes on the ordinance. He did not comment either way.

We’re not going to characterize that as a reversal. The official minutes from July 27 exist only as scanned images with no searchable text, so the only account of that vote and his reasoning is a contemporaneous news report. What the primary record shows is this: a council member raised a specific objection about definitional breadth, the ordinance was amended on precisely that point, and he then voted for it. That reading is at least as well supported as any other — and worth asking him about directly.

The Planning Board’s quiet but decisive role

The public hearing was originally scheduled for Aug. 10. It didn’t happen — the ordinance wasn’t on that agenda at all.

The reason is a state law requirement: a zoning ordinance has to go to the Planning Board for a written report on whether it fits the township’s master plan before the council can hold its hearing. The Planning Board took it up on Aug. 12 — two days after the original hearing date.

That’s why the vote moved to Aug. 24. It wasn’t a delay; it was the process working.

The Planning Board’s report itself isn’t public yet — minutes for that meeting hadn’t been posted as of this week. It’s worth reading when it appears, because it’s the township’s own planning judgment on whether the ordinance holds together.

Where the ban may not reach

Here is the question we went looking for, and the honest answer turned out to be more reassuring than we expected.

New Jersey law lets a town designate a redevelopment area and then adopt a redevelopment plan that overrides the ordinary zoning code. Environmental groups have flagged that statewide as a route around local bans, and it isn’t hypothetical — the New Brunswick data center rejected in February was proposed inside a redevelopment area.

East Brunswick has active redevelopment along Route 18. So does the ban reach it?

Mostly, yes. When East Brunswick set up those projects, it did it by creating actual zoning districts on the zoning map — MXD, MXD-2, MXD-3, MSMXD and others. Ordinance 26-21 lists every one of them. The ordinance also reaches beyond those districts. County assessment records place Vermella and the Brunswick Square area in HC-2, the highway commercial zone, which Ordinance 26-21 amends at § 228-178; the Township’s Fair Share Plan lists the mall site as HC-2 and OP-1, amended at § 228-113. Either way, they are inside the prohibition, not outside it.

What remains open is narrower. If the township adopts or amends a redevelopment plan in the future, state law requires that plan to state whether it overrides zoning or simply layers on top of it. Whether a future plan would carry the data center prohibition forward is a live question — but it’s a question about future decisions, not a hole in what was passed.

There’s a notable wrinkle. The chairman of the East Brunswick Redevelopment Agency is Councilman James Wendell — the same member who pressed hardest on the ordinance’s legal durability. Mayor Brad Cohen and Councilwoman Dana Winston also sit on the Agency. The people best positioned to answer this question are the people who wrote the ordinance.

Worth watching: the Agency’s Aug. 17 agenda — one week before the council vote — included a presentation on something called “Area 1A” by an outside planning firm. Minutes aren’t posted yet.

The lawsuits, and why East Brunswick’s position looks different

Data center developers are suing New Jersey towns over these bans. Monroe Township faces a $300 million complaint that argues, among other things, that banning data centers violates the First Amendment — because “data centers are a medium of expression.” Montgomery Township was sued for a similar amount by a developer that says the town acted on “public hysteria” rather than sound planning. Andover Township was sued in July. No court has ruled yet.

East Brunswick’s exposure looks lower. Each of those towns was sued by a developer with a specific property in play — in Montgomery’s case, a site plan declared complete days before the ban passed. East Brunswick has no such applicant. And the township did the procedural work: that Planning Board consistency review is exactly the “sound land use planning” record those lawsuits claim is missing elsewhere.

One more piece of context

This council has pulled an ordinance before when the legal ground looked shaky.

In October 2025 it passed a sweeping drone ordinance on first reading, 5–0, without discussion. After Eyes on EB reported that federal and state law largely reserve airspace regulation to the FAA, and drone-policy advocates brought lawyers into the conversation, Mayor Cohen announced there would be no second reading. He said the ordinance “as it was written was a little bit too broad.”

We raise it because it’s the closest local precedent for what Wendell was arguing about in July — and because it shows this council does revisit ordinances when the objection is substantive. Zimbicki noted in July that the council can amend or repeal this one as state policy develops.

What to watch

  • The Planning Board’s Aug. 12 minutes, when posted — the consistency report is the township’s own assessment of the ordinance
  • The Redevelopment Agency, and whether any future plan carries the prohibition forward
  • The three lawsuits. A ruling against any of those towns is a signal for every town that has passed one of these
  • Your electric bill. The capacity price for the year beginning this June is already locked in

Sources: East Brunswick Township Council agenda packets, July 27 and Aug. 24, 2026; Township Council meeting video, Aug. 24, 2026 (EBTV); East Brunswick Planning Board agenda, Aug. 12, 2026; East Brunswick Redevelopment Agency agenda and minutes, 2026; East Brunswick Code Chapter 228; Office of the Governor, May 27 and July 7, 2026; New Jersey Monitor; TAPinto East Brunswick; Climate Revolution Action Network NJ; PJM capacity auction data as compiled by Pashman Stein Walder Hayden.

East Brunswick’s Municipal Tax Rose About 1%. Here’s Why Your Total Bill Rose More.

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East Brunswick Municipal Tax Rose About 1%

Five different bodies tax your property. The Township Council controls about a fifth of the bill.

At the Aug. 24 Township Council meeting, a resident running for council told the room that East Brunswick property taxes were headed up “about 7% or more” this year.

Council President Dana Zimbicki answered a few minutes later: “The municipal portion of our tax is about 1% increase and has been that for about the last eight years.”

Both statements can be accurate, because they are about two different numbers. One describes the whole bill. The other describes the slice the Township Council actually sets.

You don’t pay one “East Brunswick tax”

The single figure at the bottom of your tax bill is really five separate charges, collected together by the township and passed along to the bodies that levy them.

Using the township’s own audited figures for 2025 and the adopted municipal levy, here is roughly how a dollar of East Brunswick property tax divides:

What it funds 2025 amount Share of the bill
Schools — set by the Board of Education $152,468,788 ~63%
Municipal purposes — set by the Township Council $46,990,372 ~19%
Middlesex County — set by the county commissioners $35,780,698 ~15%
Fire districts — separately elected boards $5,718,490 ~2.4%
Municipal open space — set by the Township Council $387,906 ~0.2%

Five charges, four separate authorities. The Board of Education, the county and your fire district each set their own numbers, and none of them answer to the Township Council. The council sets two of the five lines — municipal purposes and open space — which together come to a little under a fifth of the total.

Which fire district applies depends on where in town you live.

What each one did this year

The township: up 0.99%. The adopted municipal levy came in at $44,012,350, against $43,580,907 the year before. The first draft would have raised it about 3%; council members sent departments back to look again, and the township identified $875,448 in additional revenue, bringing it down to just under one percent.

Middlesex County: no increase. The county adopted its 2026 budget without raising the county tax levy.

The schools: up 6.16%, or roughly $9.56 million, according to the Board of Education’s budget.

Fire districts: varies. Each district sets its own levy, so this line depends on your address.

One term worth pinning down, because it causes confusion: these are changes in the levy — the total dollars each body raises through property taxes — not in the tax rate. The rate is calculated afterward, by dividing the levy across the town’s total assessed value.

Why the 1% figure is accurate but doesn’t describe your bill

This is the heart of it.

The Township Council controls roughly one-fifth of your property tax bill. Holding its own levy to about 1% does not hold your total bill to 1% — it holds about 19 cents of every dollar to 1%. The other 81 cents are set by people the council does not control.

Weight each body’s change by its share of the bill — this is an Eyes on EB calculation, using the audited 2025 shares above — and the picture is straightforward:

  • The school increase contributes roughly 3.9 percentage points of growth
  • The municipal increase contributes about 0.2
  • The county contributes nothing

That is why a resident can describe a bill going up several percent while the council accurately describes its own portion going up about one.

Two honest caveats on that arithmetic. It assumes each body’s levy increase flows proportionally into individual bills, which holds only if the town’s total assessed value stays flat — new construction added to the tax rolls softens the rate somewhat. And we could not establish the 2026 change for the fire districts or open space, so those are not in the total. Your own bill will differ depending on your assessment and your fire district.

What drove the school increase

The Board of Education’s budget points to cost pressures rather than new programs:

  • Health benefits up 22% — about $7.9 million
  • Charter school payments up $966,246
  • Out-of-district special education up about $2.02 million
  • Transportation up $973,348

Superintendent Dr. Evelyn Mamman has said the district’s academic programs were already “cut to the bone.”

Whether those are the right answers is a fair argument to have. It is an argument to have with the Board of Education, which sets that portion of the bill and meets monthly — not with the Township Council.

Why your August bill wasn’t the final number

Here is a detail that explains a lot of the confusion, and it comes straight from the township’s tax office.

Third-quarter bills were mailed June 30 and were based on an estimated tax rate. The township’s Tax Collector page states it plainly: “When the certified tax rate for 2026 becomes available, any adjustment for final 2026 property tax amounts will be reflected in the fourth quarter installment.”

The page also says “2026 Final / 2027 Preliminary tax bills will be mailed in September.” Quarterly payments are due Feb. 1, May 1, Aug. 1 and Nov. 1, each with a ten-day grace period.

So if you looked at your August bill and did the math on the year, you were working from an estimate. The certified figure arrives with the September mailing and lands on the Nov. 1 payment.

What to look at on your own bill

When the September bill arrives, the useful comparison isn’t the single total. It’s the lines:

  • The total — the number that actually leaves your account
  • The school portion — roughly two-thirds of it, set by the Board of Education
  • The municipal portion — about a fifth, set by the Township Council
  • The county portion — about 15%
  • Your fire district, which depends on where you live
  • Your assessment, and whether it changed

Compare those lines year over year rather than the totals alone. That is the only way to see which body actually moved your bill.

And it is worth holding both facts at once: the township’s roughly 1% figure can be entirely accurate at the same time that a homeowner’s total bill rises considerably more. They are measuring different things.

Sources: East Brunswick Township Council meeting, Aug. 24, 2026 (EBTV); Township of East Brunswick 2025 Audit Synopsis; 2026 Municipal Budget Advertisement; East Brunswick Tax Collector, eastbrunswick.org; East Brunswick Board of Education FY2026 budget; Middlesex County 2026 budget.

 

Eleven Decisions in Thirty-Four Seconds: What East Brunswick’s Council Approved on Aug. 24

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EAST BRUNSWICK, NJ — At the Aug. 24 Township Council meeting, the council president read out a range of resolution numbers, asked whether anyone wanted anything taken out, heard nothing, and called for a vote. Four council members said yes. Thirty-four seconds after it began, on the meeting video, it was over.

In those thirty-four seconds the council approved eleven separate items, including a year-long lease of 121 township parking spaces to a car dealership, a $60,420 emergency contract awarded without competitive bidding, and a bill list totalling $2,940,472.24.

None of the eleven was discussed at the meeting. That is not unusual, and it is not a secret — but it does mean that a resident watching would have learned essentially nothing about what had just been decided.

What the council approved

Resolutions 26-264 through 26-274, in plain English:

  • A liquor licence extension for Jersey Wings Unlimited Inc., which traded as Arooga’s Grill House & Sports Bar and is now in Chapter 7 bankruptcy, passing the licence to the trustee.
  • A transfer of that licence to A9 Family LLC, which will trade as 18 East Kitchen & Bar.
  • A transfer of a second licence, from East Brunswick GRP Inc., which traded as Sunny Palace, to Route 18 Holdings LLC.
  • Liens on two properties — 8 Barrie Road and 4 Amanda Court — after the township had the lawns cut and the owners did not respond to notices. The liens are $580 and $1,160, the cost of the work plus a $20 administrative fee.
  • Permission for the Lunar Faire Night Market at the Middlesex County Fairgrounds on Sept. 12, from 5 to 10 p.m.
  • About a dozen tax and utility refunds, most of them duplicate third-quarter tax payments made at a house closing, individually ranging from roughly $290 to $5,900.
  • A refund of $8,280.06 to Pro Cap 8, LLC, which had bought a tax lien at the December sale and was repaid after the owner redeemed it.
  • A $60,420 emergency contract with NJ Air Pros to replace two HVAC units at the Community Arts Center on Cranbury Road, which failed on Aug. 3. State law lets a town skip bidding in an emergency; the business administrator declared one, and this vote ratified it.
  • A lease of 121 parking spaces on the fourth floor of the Transportation and Commerce Center to Space Auto Group LLC of Route 18, for $6,000 a month from Sept. 1 through Aug. 31 next year. The company will use them to park vehicle inventory.
  • Permission for Fire District No. 2 to buy gasoline through the township’s fuel resale system at cost plus an administrative fee.
  • The bill list — $2,940,472.24 in payments.

How a consent agenda works

Grouping routine business into a single vote is standard practice in New Jersey municipal government, and East Brunswick uses it at nearly every meeting. The Aug. 10 meeting handled nine resolutions the same way.

The agenda itself explains the rule, in print: the items “are considered routine and non-controversial items by the Township Council and will be enacted upon by one motion,” and “there will be no separate discussion of these items unless a Council Member so requests,” in which case the item is pulled out and voted on separately. The agenda even carries a standing section headed “Resolution[s] Removed From The Consent Agenda For Discussion And Vote.”

On Aug. 24 that section was empty. Council President Dana Zimbicki asked directly — “Does anybody need anything separated from the agenda?” — and no one did.

The paperwork was public beforehand. The full 66-page agenda packet, including the lease agreement, the emergency certification and a roughly 21-page itemised bill list showing every vendor and purchase order, was posted on the township website and filed with the clerk. The bill list is dated Aug. 18, six days before the meeting.

Two of the eleven items describe the same lawn. Resolution 26-267 records that the township had the grass cut at 4 Amanda Court after a July 31 notice, at a cost of $1,140, and places a lien of $1,160 on the property — the work plus a $20 administrative fee. The itemised bill list in the same packet shows that $1,140 going out the door: a payment to Broehl’s Lawn Maintenance, Inc., purchase order 26004339, described as “4 Amanda Court Property Mainte.” The records show the township paid the contractor and is seeking to recover the cost through the lien.

It is also worth saying plainly what cannot be known from the video: what council members read, what they asked staff, or what they discussed before the meeting. The public record shows what happened in public. It does not show what preparation went into it.

Why it is worth watching anyway

The council does debate things. Minutes after the consent vote, the same four members spent roughly three minutes on an ordinance adding time-limit parking to four streets — Burnham Place, High Point Road, Madeline Avenue and Oliver Court — with two of them explaining that it came from a resident’s complaint two weeks earlier.

Councilman Behal was absent on Aug. 24. Councilmen McEvoy and Wendell, Councilwoman Winston and Council President Zimbicki all voted yes.

The difference is not effort. It is visibility. An item that goes in the consent agenda gets no explanation at the meeting, so the only way to know what it does is to open the packet.

The next council meeting is Sept. 14, when the parking ordinance gets its public hearing. The agenda packet goes up on the township website before the meeting — and the consent agenda is usually the longest part of it.

That Construction at the Mall Isn’t the Apartments. The Housing Decision Hasn’t Happened — and It’s Due Sept. 30

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WHAT'S REALLY HAPPENING AT BRUNSWICK SQUARE mall

Update, Sept. 27, 2026: On Sept. 14, the East Brunswick Township Council voted 5–0 to introduce Ordinance 26-25, which would adopt a proposed redevelopment plan for Brunswick Square. The plan would allow up to 250 residential units. It has not been adopted. The Council’s public hearing on the ordinance is scheduled for Monday, Sept. 28, at 7:30 p.m. in the Municipal Courtroom. Read our preview of the plan and our report on the Sept. 14 meeting. The original article, published Aug. 27, follows unchanged.

Answering the question we get asked most about Brunswick Square — and what we found while looking it up.

One of the questions Eyes on EB gets most often is a simple one: what exactly are they building at the mall?

It’s a fair thing to wonder. You can see construction underway right now, and for years there’s been talk about redevelopment and housing at that property. Naturally, people put the two together and assume the work happening today is the start of the apartments.

It isn’t.

What’s going up now is the shopping center’s retail renovation. The housing redevelopment is a completely separate process — and that decision hasn’t been made yet.

Here’s what we found while answering the question. East Brunswick’s own revised Fair Share Plan says a redevelopment plan for Brunswick Square is to be adopted by September 30, 2026. And as of Aug. 27, reviewing every Township Council and Planning Board agenda posted through Aug. 26, we found no Brunswick Square redevelopment plan scheduled on any of them.

That doesn’t mean no draft exists — plans are usually written before they reach an agenda, and agendas often post only days ahead. But it does mean the redevelopment plan has not yet appeared on the public Council or Planning Board agendas we reviewed, and the deadline is about five weeks out.

1. So what are they building right now?

A retail renovation. The enclosed mall is being turned into an open-air shopping center.

Mayor Brad Cohen described it at a July town hall: the property is being reinvested in “right now on the mall side,” and it’s “pretty much going to stay retail.” He named tenants moving in — Nordstrom Rack, a PGA golf store, J Crew, Fun City — and ones staying, including Barnes & Noble, LensCrafters and Results Boxing. The Redevelopment Agency was told in June the mall work is “scheduled to be completed by the end of the year.”

That’s the construction. Stores, not housing.

2. Then what’s the housing plan?

Every New Jersey town has a legal obligation to provide a realistic opportunity for affordable housing. The state rewrote those rules in 2024, replacing the old Council on Affordable Housing with a court-supervised process on a fixed schedule.

East Brunswick is in that process now — the “Fourth Round,” covering 2025 through 2035. Its plan is on file with the Superior Court in Middlesex County, and part of how the township proposes to meet its obligation is by putting housing at Brunswick Square.

The township’s Fourth Round Housing Element and Fair Share Plan, revised this past February, states it directly: a redevelopment plan for the mall site will be prepared “including a required affordable housing set-aside component, to be adopted by September 30, 2026.“

That date isn’t something someone floated at a meeting. It’s written into the plan the township filed with the court, after the township asked for and received an extension.

3. What’s actually been decided? Less than you’d think.

The Fair Share Plan includes a page describing the Brunswick Square site. Here’s what it says:

  • Total units: TBD
  • Affordable units: TBD
  • Unit types: TBD
  • Set-aside: 20% affordable

The written Fair Share Plan calls for a 20% affordable set-aside. But 20% of what hasn’t been decided. The plan says only “a portion” of the site’s 81 acres would become housing, and that density will be “determined in discussion with the developer.”

You may have heard the number 60. At a Feb. 25 Planning Board meeting, the township’s affordable housing planner, Kate Keller, told the board the Brunswick Square redevelopment “will be a minimum of 60 affordable units in inclusionary housing or potential for supportive housing.”

That’s a planner’s working estimate, said aloud at a public meeting. It is not what the adopted plan says. The operative document — the one filed with the court — still reads TBD. Both are worth knowing, and the difference matters: there is no approved unit count for Brunswick Square, and you can’t work backward from 60 to figure out how big the project will be.

One more thing worth clearing up — and here we owe readers a correction of our own. “The mall” isn’t one property, and it isn’t three.

Covering a council meeting last November, we reported the mayor’s description: the mall is entirely privately owned, and “multiple entities — the mall itself, Macy’s, and JCPenney — own different portions.” He put it memorably: “News flash — we don’t own it.”

That was accurate as far as it went. But checked against county property records, the redevelopment area is more divided than three: ten separate lots with at least seven different owners along Route 18 and Summerhill Road. Brunswick Square proper and three adjoining parking and vacant parcels belong to a Lakewood company, E&P at East Brunswick LLC. The JCPenney building is owned by JCPenney’s own corporate real estate arm. The Olive Garden parcel belongs to an entity managed by Darden Restaurants. The tire and auto shop is Bridgestone’s. Three more lots belong to three other companies. The plan itself calls the site “Brunswick Square Mall and Pad Sites.”

That’s not a technicality. A redevelopment plan has to work across all of it — part of why this takes time.

(As for Macy’s: the mayor said in November that Macy’s no longer owns its building and is renting through 2027, and in July that the store is due out by April. County records confirm Macy’s owns no property in East Brunswick. Which company owns that building now, we couldn’t determine.)

4. What happens between now and Sept. 30 — and when do you get a say?

First, some plain English about a phrase that sounds worse than it is.

In March 2025 the Township Council declared the mall site an area in need of redevelopment — technically a “Condemnation Area in Need of Redevelopment,” under Resolution 25-139. That designation is the first step in a legal process. It doesn’t approve housing, rezone anything, or authorize a single apartment. It gives the township the legal footing to write a redevelopment plan.

The word “condemnation” means the designation carries the potential authority to acquire property by eminent domain. We found nothing indicating the township intends to use it, and Keller told the Planning Board that on the township’s housing sites generally, “each of the property owners are all on board” and “we’re not rezoning anybody against their will.”

So here’s where things actually stand:

Step Status
Area declared in need of redevelopment ✅ Done, March 2025
Redevelopment plan adopted ❌ Not done — due Sept. 30
A developer chosen ❌ Not in any record we found
A building plan filed and approved ❌ Not done
Construction ❌ Not done

Keller laid out the route at the February meeting: the plan “would go start at council, but it would come before you for a consistency review, as redevelopment plans do.” After that, the Planning Board is done “until site plan applications start coming in.”

In order, that means: the Council introduces the plan at a public meeting; the Planning Board reviews it in public for consistency with the township’s master plan; the Council holds a public hearing and votes. Later, a developer gets selected, files an actual building plan, and the Planning Board holds a second round of hearings with legal notice to nearby property owners.

So there are two chances to weigh in: one on the rules for the site, which has to happen before Sept. 30, and one on the actual buildings, later.

The next Township Council meeting is Sept. 14.

To be clear about what hasn’t happened

The township hasn’t missed anything. Sept. 30 hasn’t arrived. Every other piece of East Brunswick’s housing plan was adopted on schedule in March — the mall plan is the one remaining item, and it’s on an extension the court granted.

Keller told the board in February that because of that extension “the township will still be in compliance,” and that officials are “actively working and pursuing that.”

What we couldn’t establish is what happens if Sept. 30 passes without a plan adopted. State law spells out consequences for missing the earlier township-wide deadline in March, which East Brunswick met. Whether the same applies to this specific extension isn’t stated in any document we obtained, and we’re not going to guess. We’ve requested the underlying court records.

What to watch

  • The Sept. 14 Township Council meeting — watch the agenda to see whether the redevelopment plan appears
  • The Planning Board agenda — a consistency review has to happen before adoption
  • The plan itself, when it posts. That’s what will finally say how many homes, how tall, and where on the 81 acres
  • Sept. 30

We’ll report the plan the moment it appears.

Sources: Township of East Brunswick Fourth Round Housing Element and Fair Share Plan, revised February 2026; East Brunswick Planning Board minutes, Feb. 25, 2026; Township Council Resolution 25-139, March 24, 2025, as cited in the Fair Share Plan; Mayor’s Town Hall, July 16, 2026 (EBTV); East Brunswick Redevelopment Agency minutes, June 15, 2026; Middlesex County Board of Taxation assessment records; Superior Court of New Jersey, Law Division, Middlesex County, Docket MID-L-000119-25. Agendas reviewed via the township’s Agenda Center.

 

Milltown Road Ramp to Route 18 North Set to Close Aug. 31 — and Won’t Reopen Until 2029

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If you get onto Route 18 north from Milltown Road, your commute is about to change.

The New Jersey Department of Transportation has scheduled that ramp to close on Aug. 31 and stay closed for the length of a bridge replacement project that, by the state’s own timeline, runs into 2029.

The ramp — NJDOT calls it Ramp ME — carries Milltown Road westbound traffic onto Route 18 northbound. This is not an overnight closure. NJDOT’s project materials say it “will remain closed throughout construction.”

There is also a deadline attached to this that hasn’t been widely publicized: the public comment period on the project closes Sept. 10.

One caveat worth stating plainly: NJDOT describes the Aug. 31 date as tentative, and as of this week the department had not issued a separate closure advisory for the bridge project. NJDOT typically announces closures only a few days in advance.

What’s being built

This is a replacement, not a repair.

NJDOT is tearing out the Route 18 northbound bridge that crosses Conrail’s Sayreville Industrial Track — a rail line most drivers never notice, because it runs underneath the highway.

The bridge went up in 1931. The state describes it as being in poor condition, nearing the end of its service life and needing more and more maintenance to stay open. Its clearance over the tracks is also too low by current standards.

The new bridge will be a single span, and the roadway will be raised to give trains more room underneath. The rebuilt stretch adds an auxiliary lane and a six-foot sidewalk, and the center median is being replaced with concrete barrier and islands.

The work area covers roughly 1,750 feet — from the Route 18 and Milltown Road interchange north to about Icker Avenue, according to NJDOT’s project documents.

Where you’ll be sent instead

NJDOT’s detour keeps Milltown Road westbound drivers inside the existing interchange to get onto Route 18 north. The entrance to the highway will be stop-controlled, which the department says is meant to prevent confusion inside an active work zone.

The state’s own analysis calls the added travel time “minimal,” and notes that drivers who know the area may simply skip the detour and use Old Bridge Turnpike.

Pedestrians and cyclists get a separate route, along Cranbury Road, Old Bridge Turnpike and Icker Avenue, with high-visibility signs.

Your travel lanes aren’t affected yet

Here is the part that matters most for anyone who sat through the last few years of Route 18 construction.

NJDOT’s presentation materials state: “The NJDOT has made a commitment to East Brunswick that no lanes will be closed prior to January 1st, 2027 due to this project.”

So while construction and the ramp closure begin this year, the thing residents dread most — Route 18 losing travel lanes again — is not scheduled to start until 2027.

When lane reductions do begin, the project runs in two stages, and NJDOT says at least two lanes in each direction stay open the whole time:

  • Stage 1 — two lanes each way. Expected to finish December 2027, after which all three southbound lanes return.
  • Stage 2 — three lanes southbound, two northbound. Expected to finish October 2028, after which all three northbound lanes return.
  • Final closeout — expected May 2029.

Construction is expected to happen during normal daytime hours, Monday through Friday.

What the mayor told the council

Mayor Brad Cohen briefed the Township Council on the bridge project at its Aug. 24 meeting, about a week and a half after NJDOT held a public information session at the Community Arts Center on Cranbury Road.

He told the council it was “a separate project that’s being started after the new year,” called it “a two-year project,” and said it was “limited to a 1,800 foot area that goes between Milltown Road and” Icker Avenue.

His description of the footprint is close — NJDOT puts it at about 1,750 feet.

On timing, there are two different dates in play, and they’re easy to run together. The project itself, and the ramp closure, begin in 2026. NJDOT’s commitment not to close Route 18 travel lanes because of this project runs to Jan. 1, 2027. The mayor’s “after the new year” matches the lane commitment. The construction start and the ramp closure come sooner, and NJDOT’s schedule carries the work through spring 2029 rather than two years.

The ramp closure and the Sept. 10 comment deadline did not come up at the meeting.

On the larger point, the mayor has been consistent and correct. “I know everybody likes to think it’s the town, because it goes through East Brunswick,” he told the council, “but it is a state highway. It is run and completely operated by the Department of Transportation.” He said the same thing at a council meeting last October. The township does not set this schedule, and residents with complaints have to take them to Trenton.

Cohen also noted that the August session drew a thin crowd. “There were more DOT people there than residents,” he said. Councilman Kevin McEvoy, who went, said the presentation was thorough and that residents could talk one-on-one with state staff afterward.

Township Administrator Joseph Criscuolo told the council that NJDOT left materials behind and that a display of the project area, photos and handouts is set up at the East Brunswick Public Library.

The other Route 18 project isn’t finished either

The bridge job is separate from the construction East Brunswick has been living with since 2023.

That project — drainage and pavement rehabilitation — is an $86.1 million federally funded rebuild covering about four and a half miles of Route 18. And according to NJDOT’s own announcement on Aug. 4, it still has a way to go.

Overnight lane closures between Rues Lane and the New Jersey Turnpike are running 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., Monday through Friday, through December 2026, for milling, paving and final striping. At least one lane stays open. NJDOT warns the overnight work will also close ramps and limit access to side streets and businesses, with posted detours.

The full project is expected to be completed in late 2027.

That squares with what the mayor told the council — that remaining paving would be “done at night so it doesn’t interfere with any commuter traffic,” and that daytime lanes were coming back. It is worth knowing, though, that the state’s own paperwork has the larger job running well past this summer.

How to comment — before Sept. 10

NJDOT’s 30-day public comment period on the bridge project runs through Thursday, Sept. 10.

  • Email: info@rt18nbbridgeoverconrail.com
  • Project website: rt18nbbridgeoverconrail.com — the full presentation, the traffic management plan and the construction plan are all posted there

After Sept. 10, questions go to Patience Sengbey, NJDOT Regional Coordinator, at 609-963-1982 or patience.sengbey@dot.nj.gov.

For day-to-day closures and real-time conditions, NJDOT points motorists to 511nj.org.

Why we’re telling you this now

A year ago, when Ryders Lane was closed around the clock for Conrail track work while Route 18 was down to two lanes, residents told this publication the same thing over and over. It wasn’t the work they objected to. It was finding out too late.

“It’s not that people don’t want the work done,” one resident said at the time. “It’s that everything is happening all at once, with no thought to how it affects the rest of us.”

The comment window on this one is still open. It closes Sept. 10.

Sources: New Jersey Department of Transportation — Route 18 Northbound Bridge over Conrail Replacement Project, Public Information Center presentation materials, Aug. 13, 2026; NJDOT news release, Aug. 4, 2026. East Brunswick Township Council meeting, Aug. 24, 2026 (EBTV).

A Shift Worth Noticing: Putting East Brunswick’s Students First

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By Rachel Botnick 

“College is not high school. So when we say we want to prepare students for college, it doesn’t mean that we make them college students now.”

Those words from Board President Dr. Marianne Tanious captured an important theme of the August 20 East Brunswick Board of Education meeting.

Of course, we must prepare our children for what comes next, whether that is college, trade school, the military, or the workforce. But that does not mean forgetting who they are developmentally right now.

Throughout the meeting, I saw a Board of Education and administrative team willing to question familiar systems, consider new information, and remain focused on what is best for East Brunswick’s students. That shift in mindset deserves to be recognized. In the world of education and Social Emotional Learning (SEL) we call this a growth mindset.

Removing Midterms and Finals Does Not Eliminate Testing

East Brunswick High School Principal Dr. Bucior gave a thorough presentation explaining the decision to eliminate traditional midterms and finals.

When the district’s original email was released, many families understandably had questions. Without the full explanation, “eliminating midterms and finals” could easily have sounded like “eliminating testing” or “eliminating cumulative assessment.”

That is not what is happening.

Students will continue to be assessed through unit tests, common assessments, cumulative assessments, quizzes, writing, projects, labs, presentations, discussions, and performance tasks. They will still develop study habits, time-management skills, test-taking strategies, and the ability to perform under pressure.

Cumulative assessment is already taking place throughout the school year. Students learn a concept, receive feedback, and encounter that material again alongside newer learning. In almost any textbook unit, you will find review questions that revisit previously taught skills, along with opportunities for students to apply those skills in new and more complex ways. This is already happening, and those opportunities are not going away. In my professional opinion, they will not only increase but also become more meaningful and student-centered.

Board Vice President Dr. Wilbur Pan raised an important question about whether teachers would still be able to use their professional judgment when a particular class could handle, or needed, more rigor and challenge.

This is exactly what the change allows. Teachers will have the flexibility to respond to the students sitting in front of them, while the district establishes clearer guidelines for the number and variety of assessments students must receive.

This is not permission to assess less. It is an opportunity to assess more purposefully.

The district summarized the goal well:

“We’re not asking less of our students. We’re just asking our assessments to tell us more.”

One statistic deserves particular attention. Approximately 73 percent of seniors were already exempt from taking all their final exams.

Many students whose families are now concerned about losing the experience of high-stakes testing were often no longer taking these exams by the end of high school. Keeping traditional finals did not guarantee that every student received that experience.

Higher-performing students were often exempt, while Tier 2 and Tier 3 students, those already needing more academic support, were more likely to take every exam.

The district also reported that approximately 27 percent of students failed at least one final, while the overall high school course failure rate was approximately 4 percent. For some students, one heavily weighted exam could affect a course average, future placement in academic and or extracurricular activities, and inherently affect their confidence in their ability to succeed.

That raises an important question. If finals are necessary preparation for future high-stakes testing, why were so many of our highest-performing students excused from taking them? Why was exemption viewed as a reward, while replacing finals with cumulative assessments is now being described as reducing rigor?

The old system did not provide students with equitable opportunities to experience and prepare for high-stakes testing. Instead, it distributed the burden unevenly, often placing the greatest pressure on students who were already struggling.

This speaks directly to a larger priority identified by the Board. Children’s mental health and well-being must remain at the forefront of decision-making. It is refreshing to see a Board of Education authentically identifying its “why” through action, not just words.

Research, Growth, and Communication

Dr. Tanious deserves credit for looking beyond East Brunswick while researching this change. She contacted school districts in Massachusetts, a state often compared with New Jersey educationally, and examined the history of the high school assessment model.

High schools largely inherited midterms and finals from universities. That does not automatically make them ineffective. It does make it reasonable to consider whether two heavily weighted exams remain the best approach for today’s students.

Dr. Pan also raised legitimate questions about preparing students for consequential exams in college, the trades, the military, and licensed professions. He listened to the responses and acknowledged that this change could recover eight to sixteen instructional days, potentially providing 5 to 10 percent more learning time.

Our children need to see adults asking difficult questions, listening to new information, and being willing to reconsider their assumptions. That is part of thoughtful leadership.

The district could have done a better job with its initial communication. Dr. Buscior’s presentation was detailed and informative, but families should have received that explanation before being asked to accept a major instructional change. Earlier communication may have prevented some of the confusion and concern.

The Future of East Brunswick High School

The other major issue discussed was the future of East Brunswick High School.

No one wants a referendum or a higher tax bill. However, avoiding a referendum is not necessarily the same as avoiding the expense altogether. Unfortunately, the expense itself is unavoidable.

The architects discussed maintaining the existing school, relocating the temporary classrooms, constructing a separate academy for ninth grade or another grade level, and building a new four-grade high school.

The preliminary estimates were:

  • Up to approximately $300 million to maintain the existing high school.
  • Approximately $323 million to maintain it while relocating the temporary classrooms.
  • Approximately $386 million to maintain it while constructing a ninth-grade academy.
  • Approximately $385 million to $425 million for a new four-grade high school.

These are preliminary figures, not final bids or tax calculations. Further planning, state approvals, possible debt-service aid, financing, and environmental reviews are still needed.

Still, maintaining the current school while adding a ninth-grade academy could cost about the same as the lower estimate for a new school. It would not reset the life cycle of the existing building or resolve all of its shared-space problems.

Board members asked the architects about capacity, traffic, asbestos, underground infrastructure, construction disruption, and future enrollment. Because the original plans showing what lies beneath the 1958 building are no longer available, renovation could uncover unexpected problems. A full renovation could also take six to eight years, affecting an entire generation of students.

The Board has not formally selected a plan, and the community must receive complete information before voting on any referendum. However, the discussion made it clear that maintaining the existing school is not a simple or inexpensive alternative.

One brief exchange also deserves attention. After seeing the new housing along Route 18, an architect from PSA, the firm presenting the plans, assumed that the development would expand the tax base and help offset school construction costs. He was quickly reminded, “No, no. PILOTs.”

Before any referendum vote, the community deserves a clear explanation of how development, enrollment growth, PILOT agreements, and school infrastructure costs connect.

Other Community Updates

Several other updates were shared toward the end of the meeting:

  • ESL program: ESL Supervisor Mrs. DiBenedetti discussed East Brunswick’s multilingual learners, including areas of progress and areas where the district needs greater consistency. The presentation was informative and explanatory and received praise from the Board as a whole.
  • Graduation location: East Brunswick High School’s graduation will move from the Cure Insurance Arena in Trenton to Jersey Mike’s Arena in Piscataway. Graduation is expected to move from June 18 to June 17, pending a calendar revision.
  • Dual enrollment: Students can currently take a three-credit Middlesex College course for $150. Some pathways may allow students to earn transferable college credits or work toward an associate degree.
  • Earlier information: The district is working to introduce dual-enrollment opportunities before students enter ninth grade, giving families more time to plan.

These updates reinforce the fact that our students will follow different paths and that our schools must prepare them for more than one definition of success.

The August 20 meeting showed a Board and administration willing to research, question, listen, and grow. They may not agree on every detail or every proposed solution, but that kind of thoughtful discussion is important.

Student-centered decision-making requires a Board of Education to look beyond any single outcome, tradition, or perspective and understand the educational ecosystem as it exists today. Our schools, our students, and the world they are preparing to enter are constantly changing. Effective leadership means recognizing that bigger picture and being progressive enough to navigate the path forward through that lens.

As the upcoming Board of Education election approaches, we should expect anyone seeking a place in this space to continue on that trajectory. Candidates should be prepared to ask difficult questions, listen to new information, and make decisions with the entire educational ecosystem in mind. Our district’s experiences over the past decade have shown us how important it is to have leadership that remains focused on the bigger picture and responsive to the changing needs of our students.

Whether we are discussing assessments, programs, communication, or a multimillion-dollar investment, the question guiding every decision should always be:

Does this serve all our children?

 

East Brunswick May Be One of the Last Districts in Middlesex County Still Giving Midterms and Finals. Is That About to Change?

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East Brunswick midterms and finals

During the July 23 East Brunswick Board of Education meeting, Superintendent Dr. Mammon raised a topic that could impact many students and families in the district: the future role of midterm and final exams.

The discussion may not have been the biggest item on the agenda, but it raised an important question about how students are assessed and how schools continue to adapt.

Are traditional midterms and finals still the best way to measure what students know?

For decades, semester exams have been a familiar part of the high school experience. Students prepare for cumulative tests that cover material from a marking period or semester, and those exams become one piece of their overall grade.

But education continues to change, and districts across the country continue to look at how students demonstrate learning.

That does not mean there is one right answer.

The discussion around midterms and finals has become a balance between maintaining academic expectations while also looking at student stress, mental health, and whether traditional exams provide the most complete picture of student understanding.

Why Some Educators Still See Value in Midterms and Finals

Supporters of traditional exams point to the skills they can help develop.

Preparing for a large exam requires students to organize information, manage their time, and take responsibility for their own learning. Those are skills that can be valuable in college, careers, and everyday life.

A cumulative exam can also show whether students understand material beyond a single assignment or project.

For some students, learning how to prepare for a high-pressure situation is an important part of their education.

Why Some Schools Are Rethinking Traditional Exams

At the same time, many educators have questioned whether one or two major exams should carry significant weight in determining a student’s understanding of a subject.

A student may understand the material but struggle during a high-pressure testing environment. Another student may perform well on a test but have difficulty applying that knowledge outside of an exam setting.

Because of this, some schools have placed more emphasis on ongoing assessments, projects, presentations, writing assignments, and other ways for students to demonstrate what they have learned.

The goal is not necessarily fewer expectations. The goal is finding the best way to measure learning.

The Mental Health Conversation

Another important part of this discussion is the impact major exams can have on student stress.

The weeks leading up to midterms and finals can be challenging for many students as they balance multiple exams, assignments, activities, and other responsibilities.

That does not mean students should avoid difficult experiences. Learning how to handle pressure, prepare, and manage responsibilities are important life skills.

The question is how schools can maintain those expectations while also supporting student well-being.

During the BOE meeting, Dr. Mammon also spoke about balancing leadership responsibilities with everyday life, including the excitement of welcoming a new baby. That moment was a reminder that the people making decisions for our schools are also people managing the same challenges of balancing responsibilities and priorities.

Update: The following section was added after the original publication to provide additional context and transparency. As the discussion continued and more questions were raised, we wanted to include additional information gathered during our follow-up reporting.

How Comparable Districts Are Approaching Midterms and Finals

One of the most important parts of this discussion is looking beyond East Brunswick and seeing how other comparable districts approach student assessments.

This is not about whether schools value academic achievement. They do. The question is how those districts measure student learning and whether traditional midterms and finals are still the best way to accomplish that goal.

When looking at districts often compared with East Brunswick academically and demographically, there are several different approaches.

Edison and J.P. Stevens have moved away from a traditional midterm structure. According to the comparison reviewed, the district eliminated midterms years ago and adjusted its assessment model.

South Brunswick takes a more course-specific approach. Rather than having a separate districtwide midterm schedule, assessments depend on the individual course and are given during the regular class period.

West Windsor-Plainsboro North and South have moved away from the traditional midterm and final exam model, according to the comparison reviewed.

Rumson-Fair Haven Regional has also taken a different approach. The district still uses final assessments, but the format can include different options such as projects, videos, and alternative demonstrations of learning.

Monroe Township and Montgomery have moved away from traditional midterms while maintaining end-of-year finals.

Other districts in the comparison have also adjusted their assessment structures:

  • South Plainfield eliminated midterms, moved to quarterly assessments, and later adjusted its approach again to focus on final exams.
  • Woodbridge High School, including JFK and Colonia, uses a semester-based block schedule, meaning what may traditionally be considered a midterm functions differently because assessments occur within the course structure.
  • North Brunswick does not use a separate midterm schedule and follows a quarterly approach.
  • Sayreville uses quarterly assessments rather than traditional midterms.
  • Highland Park does not use finals and uses quarterly assessments in areas such as English and math.

East Brunswick remains one of the districts using a more traditional midterm and final structure.

The larger takeaway is that districts with similar academic expectations have not all made the same decision. Some have removed traditional midterms, some have reduced their role, some have kept finals, and others have created different ways for students to demonstrate mastery.

The conversation happening in East Brunswick is not about lowering expectations. It is about asking whether the current assessment model is still the best fit for students today.

What Could This Mean for East Brunswick?

The conversation around midterms and finals is part of a much larger discussion happening in education.

Schools are constantly evaluating whether long-standing practices still align with their goals for students.

The question is not simply whether students should take exams.

The bigger question is whether the current approach gives educators the best understanding of what students know and what skills they are developing.

East Brunswick is now having that conversation.

Any changes to the district’s approach would require input from educators, administrators, students, and families. It is a discussion that will likely continue as schools look at how to balance academic rigor, student preparation, and the changing needs of today’s learners.

Sometimes the most important conversations at a Board of Education meeting are not about a final decision that has already been made.

They are about the questions being asked before those decisions happen.

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