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Essex County commissioners approve contracts, grants and nominations in Oct. 28 meeting
Summary
The Essex County board approved a slate of contracts, grants and advisory-board appointments, including a monitoring contract for the jail, a signal engineering contract, procurement extensions, a cybersecurity amendment and several grant awards.
At its Oct. 28 conference meeting, the Essex County Board of County Commissioners approved multiple resolutions authorizing contracts, grant participation and advisory-board appointments.
Key board actions included:
- Approval of resolutions 1–13 (advice-and-consent appointments and reappointments to county advisory boards), with resolution 3 withdrawn by the administration.
- Resolution 15: Approved a contract monitoring and operational review engagement with the Ambrose Group for work at the county correctional facility. Director Charles told the board the scope includes capital and IT improvements and training; commissioners requested a written update on prior Ambrose work and asked that the review include parking-lot security measures.
- Resolution 16: Approved a state-contract award to Atlantic Tactical for ammunition required for officer qualifications (amount cited in the record).
- Resolution 17: Approved a restorative and transformative justice pilot grant agreement to UCC for $145,001.79 for July 1–June 30.
- Resolutions 18–19: Approved an emergency repair at High Lawn with a final cost of $489,572.50 paid from operating funds and a 20% change order of $25,332 for portable lighting towers tied to events.
- Resolutions 20–23: Awarded multiple Public Works contracts, including BrightView Engineering a one-year construction engineering and inspection contract for adaptive traffic signals along Central Avenue in Orange (not to exceed $594,566), a Krapco contract for mastic material ($363,600), a VIP Services window-washing contract ($126,380), and a 24-month extension to Northeast Roof Maintenance (not to exceed $177,900).
- Prosecutor's Office: Approved a contract to rehab a donated 2007 command vehicle at a reported cost of $252,281.67 for use as a mobile command center.
- Resolution 25: Approved participation in an Attorney General-administered Helping Hand grant program (FY2026) for $105,000 (contract period 09/01/2025–08/31/2026).
- Resolution 26 and 56: Approved a RELX (LexisNexis) online legal research contract (10/01/2025–09/30/2027; not to exceed $100,000) and a bedding/linens unit-cost contract not to exceed $350,000.
- Resolution 27: Approved an amendment to the county’s cybersecurity contract with SHI for $879,727.04 to complete the scope of services.
- Resolution 53: Approved retention of outside counsel for Sergeant Crawford in litigation where a conflict was identified.
- Resolutions 54–55: Inserted $10,000 in county budget revenue from the New Jersey Department of Human Services for the Code Blue program and awarded that additional funding to the YMCA of Newark & Vicinity to provide added services.
- Returned to and approved Resolution 14, a year-end budget transfer reported by County Treasurer Hussam Mohammed; much of the transfer funds will cover salaries and wages in the corrections office following contract settlements.
All of the above items were moved, seconded and approved by roll call in the meeting; several commissioners were absent for parts of the session. The board recorded roll-call votes for grouped blocks of resolutions and for individual contract items in the transcript.
