latest news from Livingston

Children’s Theatre of Livingston (CTL) takes the stage this weekend with Disney’s Alice In Wonderland Jr.! The show, featuring more than 50 elementary school children, will be presented in one act and is suitable for the entire family. Performances are this Saturday and Sunday, March 10 and 11, at 12:30 and 3 p.m. each day, at the Eisenhower Corporate Center, 290 West Mt. Pleasant Avenue.

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At the March 5 Board of Education meeting, its first public meeting since the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, Livingston superintendent Christina Steffner stressed the importance of ensuring the well-being of everyone within the district’s schools.

“We don’t take anything more seriously than the safety of our students and staff,” Steffner said, before providing an overview of the district’s school safety procedures.

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At Monday night’s Livingston Township Council meeting, a resident discussed her concerns about a home on her street, which is available for rent on Airbnb. The Council also passed several resolutions authorizing change orders for work done in the township, which all came in under budget and will save the municipality more than $200,000, and approved a contract for water main work.

Monday’s meeting was the first for the new township manager Barry Lewis. He was welcomed by the Council at both the regular and conference meetings, and was thanked for all he has done since starting the job on March 1.

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Livingston police this week arrested two people in a bizarre domestic incident, charged a Livingston resident with drug possession, began investigating a burglary on Rainbow Ridge Drive, and made an arrest in an assault reported last week at the Livingston Mall.

Burglary and Assault

In a bizarre turn of events, a domestic dispute between an East Orange couple on Monday, March 5, escalated into two burglaries and an assault on a Livingston resident by a man wearing only underpants and socks.

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Former Livingston resident Jean Dudley Weeks Friedman died on February 23. She and her late husband, Gene, lived in Livingston until they retired and moved to Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Born and raised in New York City, Mrs. Friedman attended Hunter High School and Hunter College, graduating Phi Beta Kappa at the age of 20. She later worked at Prudential, earning the CLU and FLMI certifications as well as an MBA. Mrs. Friedman is survived by her sons, Del Friedman and his wife, Stephanie Cox Suarez, of Acton, Massachusetts, and Robert Friedman and his wife, Robin Donawitz Friedman,of Martinsville; her daughter, Wendy Friedman and her husband, James Jauchem, of San Antonio, Texas; four grandchildren; her brother-in-law, Alan Friedman of New Haven, Connecticut; and her brother and sister-in-law, Noel and Dora Friedman, of Nashua, New Hampshire. A memorial service will be held on July 1 in Massachusetts. Donations in Mrs.

Paul Robert Olshen died Thursday, March 1, after a lengthy illness. Mr. Olshen was a native of Brooklyn, New York. He was a graduate of Erasmus Hall High School and New York University, and a member of Tau Epsilon Phi fraternity. Mr. Olsehn worked as an insurance broker for 57 years. He started his career working with his father, Henry Olshen, at Henry B. Olshen and Associates. He later worked at Brokerage Resources Incorporated, PRO Consultants Inc., Dewitt Stern Imperatore Ltd., and most recently Capacity Coverage Company. Mr. Olshen was involved in professional organizations serving as president of the Council of Insurance Brokers of Greater New York and of the General Insurance Brokers Association of New York. A resident of Livingston since 1966, Mr. Olshen served on the Livingston Planning Board for many years. He was a founding member of Livingston’s recycling initiative, and was instrumental in running the original recycling program in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Kenneth Powell, former owner of the Essex Bridge Center, died Monday, February 26 at the Livingston home of his son and daughter-in-law, Alan and Meagan, and his wife, Rosalind. Born in Jamestown, New York, in 1943, Mr. Powell’s early career was in music and college administration. He earned a bachelor of music degree from Oberlin College Conservatory and a master’s and doctorate in organ performance from the University of Illinois. For 15 years, he was a professor and administrator at Centenary College (now University) in Hackettstown. He then earned an MBA from Rutgers University in accounting and his CPA designation. Following this, he served as vice president for finance at Manhattan School of Music and later Monmouth University. A lifelong duplicate bridge player, in 1995 he took over the Essex Bridge Center, located in the VFW Post in Livingston, assisted by his wife and his son, Alan.

Survivors of the February 14 shooting at the Marjory Stoneham Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida spoke Sunday night in Livingston to a capacity crowd, eager to hear the students’ stories and their thoughts on gun control.

Temple B’nai Abraham in Livingston hosted the gun control rally on Sunday, which was sponsored by the Jewish Federation of MetroWest and Moms Demand Action and featured several other speakers in addition to the Parkland students. The rally was originally to have been held at the JCC in West Orange, but was moved to B’nai Abraham to accommodate the large number of attendees; even so, many of those who arrived close to the rally’s 5 p.m. starting time were turned away.

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Patrolman Mike Prendergast, who suffered a serious stroke in early December, will be returning to work at the Livingston Police Department in early March, according to his wife, Gina.

Prendergast, 49, of Tinton Falls, has been with the Livingston Police Department for the past 25 years. He suffered a stroke on Sunday, December 3, and was rushed to Jersey Shore University Medical Center, where a neurosurgeon was able to remove a clot in his brain. Prendergast then spent days in the neurological trauma/intensive care unit, surrounded by his wife, sister, older daughter, and friends.

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Opening day for Livingston Little League will also include the opening of the 2018 “Knock Cancer Out of the Park” fundraising drive.

Initiated by Steven Arsht of Livingston, “Knock Cancer Out of the Park” was established last year for the purpose of increasing pediatric cancer awareness and raising money for pediatric cancer research at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC). Arsht created the campaign in honor of Jake Kestler, his son Hayden’s best friend, who defeated one pediatric cancer only to be now facing another.

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