Mayor Ray Coles today filled us in on some of this plans for 2018.

The Mayor sent TLS the following letter:

Now that the election season is over and I have had a chance to catch my breath, I wanted to say thank you to everyone who voted in this past election.

Everyone who runs for office hopes to capture 100% of the vote, even though in our hearts we know that isn’t going to happen! To those who voted for me, thank you for your trust and support.

To those who did not, I promise to work just as hard for you and to address any issues or problems which arise.

We live in an amazing town with a lot of positive things happening every day. But, there is still an awful lot of work to be done.

In the coming year the committee will work together to address many of these issues.

Locally, we will continue our program to put sidewalks in around town and expand our road resurfacing and repair program.

We will press the county and state to expand and widen many of their roads along with improvements to our own streets.

Public Works will continue to innovate and come up with ways to better and more efficiently deliver the services our residents need. New leaf vacuum trucks will speed up the collection process and I hope we can introduce a pilot program of trash compactors downtown which could help businesses eliminate the myriad of green cans and keep our downtown cleaner.

We will work tirelessly with incoming Governor Murphy, our state legislators and the School District to fix the school funding formula once and for all.

I also hope to continue to hear from all of you. Your emails and letters have challenged and inspired me all year. As long as our residents are engaged and involved with Lakewood we have a bright future. If anyone would like to take the leap and serve on a township board or committee, please reach out to me. That is what I did almost 20 years ago. You never know where you might end up!

Thanks.