The Hopewell Township Committee is pushing Mercer County to install a traffic light at the intersection of Ingleside Avenue and Route 31.
Township engineer Jim Hutzelman reported to the Hopewell Township Committee last week that he has been talking with County and State officials about replacing the existing flashing red light at the intersection with a full traffic light. The County must sign off because Ingleside Ave., officially County Road 631, is maintained by the County.
The Township Committee expects to develop a proposal for fully lighting the notoriously difficult intersection over the coming months.
In other business, the Township Committee:
- Approved a $26.3 million budget that reduces the tax levy. Read more here.
- Introduced an ordinance to establish fees for ambulance services. Hopewell Township is the only municipality in Mercer County that doesn’t bill for the costs of ambulance services, according to Deputy Mayor Courtney Peters-Manning*. The proposed fee of $800 per call plus $30 per mile driven would likely be covered by most health insurance plans. The fee would be waived for those who are uninsured or low-income. A public hearing on the adoption of the ordinance will be held at the next regular Township Committee meeting on May 15.
- Proposed issuing a $1 million bond to finance the cost of sanitary and sewer improvements in the Princeton Farms and Hopewell Hunt developments. The improvements are necessary, according to Township Committee Member Kevin Kuchinski, because the system is being overloaded by storm water, especially during heavy rain, taking on twice the water it should be using and increasing the treatment cost charged by the Stony Brook sewer authority.
*Edit: Deputy-Mayor Peters-Manning emailed MercerMe this morning to clarify that she believes this to be true but does not know definitively. (May 11, 3:03pm)
