Packed, highly eventful Township Committee Meeting June 17, 2026 - Part 1
- Jun 28
- 7 min read
It was another wild night at the West Amwell Township Municipal Building on Wednesday night which saw the agenda and incumbent party be challenged and flamed by several residents. The place was certainly packed for the June 17th, 2026 Township Committee meeting. Several items were withdrawn after public comment, and Committeeman Fitting was called out on issues on several occasions.
Video of most of the meeting is available below:
Committee Reports
The meeting started out normally enough.
Sean Pfieffer, Land Use Board Chair, reported on the Land Use meeting from the prior night, indicating that it ran extremely late due to resident testimony regarding the Quarry House project on River Road near Big Bear and Golden Nugget. He indicated that several topics regarding animals, farm structures, and accessory buildings had not made much headway from the prior meetings, but were still a focus on the Board.
There was also a brief discussion about concerns regarding a regional planning grant being contemplated around storm water.
Harry Heller, head of West Amwell OEM and also the Technology Committee, spoke to the web site changes, acknowledging that Google searches were still broken into the site, but they are working on a potential fix with Civics Plus. Harry indicated the big eventual wins he was hoping to get from the new site was improved ADA compliance for accessibility, and getting livestream capability for Township Committee meetings. I offered my services to the Township if Harry needs assistance in fixing the Google Search issue.
Joel Coyne and Environmental Commission. Newly appointed Chairman of the Environmental Commission Joel Coyne spoke extensively about the partnership being forged between the Open Space Committee and Environmental Commission, and advocated strongly for finding a way to preserve huge tracts of land around the Alexauken creek and various headwaters and tributaries to it. He also cautioned the Township to be careful around regional grants. Mr. Coyne also spoke about the unfairness of the new New Jersey State Storm water regulations, and indicated that in his mind it is not fair to lump a small land-locked Township like West Amwell with large city-sized towns and those with different flood risk profiles.
Open to the Public
A formal 5 minute speaking clock was introduced at this meeting. It seemed to be universally disliked by the residents in the room, and certainly is not beloved of those trying to speak.
Mike Spille
That said, I was the first to speak during public comment. After thanking Mr. Heller for the comments on the website and reiterating my offer to assist, and congratulating Joel Coyne on being named EC Chair, I settled into my main topic: Brian Fitting's comments to the Hunterdon County Agricultural Development Board last May in opposition to the Paleo Family Farm's right-to-farm request.
Just prior to the TC meeting, the HC ADB had released the minutes of that meeting, which included Mr. Fitting's written testimony to the Board. Those comments are in the PDF shown below, with highlighting of specific passages I spoke to in my comments to the TC.
I noted that Mr. Fitting's comments showed that he clearly was attempting to speak as a Township Committee Member and Land Use Board member and projected that he was speaking in an official capacity. I pointed out that he opens speaking about "West Amwell Township", and "our community". He goes on to speak about "our zoning officer", and and says "our zoning officer will gladly review a revised zoning application".
I pointed out that Mr. Fitting mentions the "historical record" for the Paleo family farm, and that the "historical record" mentioned involved Mr. Fitting illegally rooting through the Paleo's township records, and then seemingly outright lying about portions of it, such as Fitting claiming that the Paleo's are not current on property taxes, and fabricating imaginary zoning violations.
I then spoke to the most troubling portion of Mr. Fitting's testimony to the HC ADB: he closes by threatening the farming community and our collective legal right-to-farm. Mr. Fitting noted that "we allow farming in every zone", but later goes on to threaten that in retaliation West Amwell may attempt to restrict farming. Specifically, he talks about "increased farm regulations in our zoning".
In short, Mr. Fitting was talking about possibly having the Township explicitly violate resident's right-to-farm legal rights.
I closed noted that Mr. Fitting had no authorization by Township government to speak as he did, from either the Township Committee or the Land Use Board. I closed by asking that Mr. Fitting be suspended immediately from the Land Use Board pending an investigation into his actions and demanding he be prosecuted.
Anthony Poleo
Anthony Poleo spoke directly to the same topic as I did: Mr. Fitting's actions and statements to the HC Agricultural Development Board. Mr. Poleo produced documents from West Amwell Township government refuting all of Mr. Fitting's allegation about the farm, showing among other things that the Paleo farm was never in arrears for taxes, had no current or prior zoning violations, and that there were no issues at all with occupancy. These were given to the clerk as evidence.
Mr. Poleo then dropped a bombshell. He accused Mr. Fitting of having an illegal apartment over his garage for literal decades. That Mr. Fitting received a loose permission from his father-in-law, Mr. Corboy, who was mayor at the time, but that no other required authorizations and permissions were given. There were issues around the apartment counting as a COAH unit despite not being legally approved, never being inspected, and the septic system for the property was not approved to include the apartment load. Mr. Poleo also brought up the potential for back taxes and the Hunterdon County Health department weighing in.
Jim Cally
Jim Cally spoke to how disturbing the Fitting saga seemed to be, and also asked that the Township investigate his actions and that he be suspended from Land Use in the meanwhile.
Gail Brewi came up next to speak (at approximately 42 minutes in the Youtube video) , indicating that she was speaking in her official capacity as tax collector, and that she also manages the construction and zoning offices. She was there to read an official statement from her office which she indicated was vetted by the State and was deemed factually correct. She read her statement into the record and provided a copy to the Townhip Clerk. She was there to speak out against resolution 87-2026 that was being discussed that night. That resolution involved a rebate of interest for late taxes for a resident. At issue is the resolution seemed to indicate that interest was improperly assessed for the property in question for late payment, Ms. Brewi indicated that her records showed that payment was in fact late and the interest was owed. Not only that, but Ms. Brewi went onto state that municipalities are specifically banned from trying not to collect interest in these cases, as it opens up the potential for preferential treatment of certain tax payers over others. Ms. Brewi claims she was never consulted on the refund, and was only aware of it after reviewing that night's Township Committee agenda.
After her statement the Township Committee decided to table the proposed refund until they could deliberate further on it and consult with the appropriate attorneys and authorities regarding the matter.
Joe Poleo
Joe Poleo spoke to the same topic of Mr. Fitting and his damaging comments about their property and family, and asked what the Township was going to do about it. Mayor Deal refused to answer, indicating "this is not my area of expertise", to which Joe Poleo shot back "you're the mayor!".
Sean Pfeiffer
He indicated he did "not like the clock and don't know why it's here". He commented on how much the political climate has changed in the 20 years he has been involved in Township matters. He indicated he was speaking only for himself and not as Land Use Board Chair. While the details of his statement weren't 100% clear, Mr. Pfeiffer seemed to be speaking to the recent spate of disagreements and disputes between the farming community and the Township Committee. He wished that the Township had tried to meet with various people and work through issues before escalating them.
CAP Bank Ordinance
This is budget season, so portions of the meeting were dedicated to budget items. The first up was establishing a so called "CAP Bank".
Jim Cally spoke during the public portion questioning the CAP limits being instituted, noting that the CAP rate was increased from prior years. The CFO was not able to indicate what the dollar amount being considered was.
Sean Pfeiffer asked that we start reducing our Open Space taxes and start transferring them to the regular municipal side.
Joel Coyne spoke to the new Storm Water Regulations from the State, indicating he felt it was wrong that West Amwell was lumped into the same category as huge cities in the State.
Bond issuance, Re-issuance, and Contingency
A hearing was opened to consider a bond re-issuance with potential re-issuance. The Bond being considered would cover costs from a recent lawsuit the Township had lost.
Mike Spille came up to question the contingency clause. Specifically, the language of the resolution allowed for up to $126,000, or 20% of the total bond amount of $620,000, to be spent on reissuance costs. The CFO seemed confused by the questions initially, with steering the CFO seemed to think it may have been a standard "contingency" fee. Mr. Spille indicated that 20% was insanely high compared to the industry, and that such costs would wipe out any savings.
Since the CFO could not answer any more indepth questions about the matter, and there was a shared concern about the amounts being contemplated, the Township Committee decided to shelve the matter for the next meeting.
This concludes Part 1 of the coverage. Part 2 should be out this week. NOTE: The July 1st, 2026 Township Committee was cancelled. The next TC Meeting is Wednesday, June 15th, 2026.