General News

The township Historic Preservation Advisory Commission held two informal hearings at its March 4 meeting, one of which dealt with a building raising and another which dealt with a proposed new home. Joachim Messing of Neuville Drive told the commission that he wants to tear down a garage on property he owns next to his house and build another home. …

UPDATE 2: The Manville Causeway bridge is now closed,  according to a state Department of Transportation spokesman. Repairs to the Manville Causeway bridge and part of Route 518 will mean road closures and detours into the summer. Rehabilitation of the causeway bridge – which traverses the Delaware & Raritan Canal and connects Weston Canal Road with Wilhousky Street in Manville …

“Several” summonses for not obeying the township’s law regarding sidewalk cleanups after snow storms have been handed out by police since the Valentine’s Day weekend storms, a police spokesman said. Several storms spanning from Feb. 12 to Feb. 18 dumped as much as 20 inches of snow on Franklin Township, according to the New Jersey State Climatologist. The township’s ordinance …

The DeForest B. Soaries Jr. Senior Residences at Somerset building was officially opened on Jan. 28. Located at 630 Franklin Blvd., the 64-unit building is geared toward senior citizens and veterans. “Twenty years ago we embarked upon the mission of revitalizing the neighborhood along the Route 27 corridor south of the St. Peter’s cemetery,” said the Rev. DeForest Soaries, after …

[wpgmappity id=”10″]   Mylar balloons released near an overhead transformer at Pine Grove and Highland avenues the afternoon of Jan. 29 sparked a power outage that affected more than 1,200 customers in the township and New Brunswick. The outage was first reported at about 2:45 p.m., said Public Service Electric & Gas spokeswoman Lindsey Puliti. She said that all customers …

The Franklin Township Police Department officially has three new police officers and one new sergeant. The four were sworn in to their positions at the Jan. 28 Township Council meeting by Township Clerk Ann McCarthy. The force’s newest Sergeant is Robert Ellis, a 10-year veteran. Police Chief Lawrence Roberts said Ellis is “very professional, very thorough.” Prior to his promotion, …

Public Service Electric & Gas is still investigating the cause of a substation failure in Somerset Jan. 24 that knocked out power to thousands of township residents. In a release, the company said that about 5,900 customers in the township lost power shortly after 11 a.m. when a substation malfunctioned. The problem also caused outages in New Brunswick and North …

Franklin Township is the launching ground for a new training tool to educate food service workers about food defense. The tool is a set of cartoons used to illustrate what food service workers should do in four common scenarios: Being presented with an unknown food source, dealing with symptoms of illness, preventing employee contamination of food and dealing with suspicious …

Franklin got an average of 9 inches of snow on Jan. 21, according to the National Weather Service. Streets were pretty drivable by about 9 a.m., as crews were out all night plowing and salting. Now we have a few days of bitterly cold weather to get through, with wind chills expected to be in the double-digit negatives. On the …

The forecasters had the snow starting after 10 a.m., but Mother Nature had other plans. Small flakes began falling several hours before that, and by 8:30 a.m., there was already the beginnings of a coating on the streets. The snow just intensified after that, and by mid-afternoon was falling heavy and fast. The initial forecast for our area called for …