Glen Ridge Mayor declares local disaster emergency over COVID-19 in rare late-night special session

Mayor Patrick called an emergency meeting on March 16, 2020 — held with less than the normal 48 hours' public notice because of the fast-moving public health situation — to formally declare a local disaster/emergency in Glen Ridge in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. The proclamation, issued under state emergency-management statutes, designated all land within the Borough as a disaster area and gave the municipal government authority to issue the orders, rules and regulations needed to respond to the crisis, including substantially altering how public meetings would be conducted going forward.

The Council adopted Resolution 57-20 ratifying the emergency meeting itself, noting that normal notice requirements could not be met given the urgency, though notice had still been faxed and mailed to local papers earlier that day. The Governing Body and Borough administration then discussed, in general terms, how the Borough planned to handle the range of challenges anticipated in the coming weeks of the pandemic. No specific programs, ordinances or spending measures were adopted at this session; it was primarily a formal declaration and a planning discussion.