News-pourri

James E. Fair, the first black member of the Millstone Valley Fire Department, was remembered April 5 as a man of great integrity and love for his community. Fair eventually rose to become chief of the department which refused him when he first applied in the 1970s.

An information session on and eligibility screening for Somerset County’s Homelessness Trust Fund is set for 6:30-8 p.m. April 10 at the Somerville Library, 35 West End Ave., Somerville. The program offers up to 15 months of rental assistance to working families.

The township’s watchdog of historic sites gave its stamp of approval to a handful of proposals at its April 1 meeting. In addition to granting certificates of appropriateness for new facade plans for the former Unclaimed Freight building on Easton Avenue, commissioners did likewise for the construction of new homes on Williams Street and Neuville Drive, the replacement of a …

Changes are underway at the former Unclaimed Freight building on Easton Avenue. Once the home of mainly a discount furniture store, the structure soon will house a gym and will get a completely new facade.

After seven years with the school district, interim schools Superintendent Evany Pagan is moving on to another position. Pagan, who was assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction before taking on the interim role at the beginning of February, next week will become the assistant superintendent of schools for the Passaic school system.

Franklin Park resident Jerry L. Midgette, the Somerset County Election Administrator, is the first African-American elected president of the New Jersey Association of Election Officials. Midgette’s election came during the NJAEO’s annual conference on March 18 in Atlantic City.

U.S. Rep. Rush Holt, D-12, says he hasn’t thought too much about what he’ll do when he leaves Congress next January. “I don’t know if I’ll go back to academia, go to a foundation, work with the (Obama) administration,” he said.

Applications to build two homes on undersized lots on Douglas Avenue and two warehouses on Roosevelt Avenue were approved at the March 5 Planning Board meeting. The home developer, Edison-based Gregory Kingburk,wants to build two, two-story homes with four bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms, he told teh board. The homes would also have full basements and one-car garages, he said.

A two-story, 160,000-square-foot addition to Sentinel Datacenters building on Cottontail Lane and Pierce Street could bring 40 new jobs into the township, the Planning Board was told at its March 5 meeting. The company in 2009 converted what was a warehouse into a 168,000-square-foot data center, its attorney, Peter Lanfrit, told the board. He said the company had always planned …

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.