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Lebanon Township Committee reappoints officials, approves professional contracts and temporary municipal budget
Summary
At its Jan. 5 reorganization meeting, the Lebanon Township Committee unanimously approved a package of annual resolutions including professional service contracts, a temporary municipal budget, bank depositories and routine administrative policies; two committee members were sworn in and leadership positions were selected.
The Lebanon Township Committee convened its annual reorganization meeting on Jan. 5, 2026, at the municipal building in Glen Gardner, where Clerk Carolynn Budd called the meeting to order and read the meeting notice required by the Open Public Meeting Act. "This is the Reorganization Meeting of the Township Committee as published in the Hunterdon Review," Budd said, adding the agenda had been posted on the township bulletin board and website.
At the start of the meeting the committee swore in newly elected members Beverly Koehler and Richard Webb, who were elected Nov. 4, 2025; Assemblyman Erik Peterson administered the oaths. On the committee’s nomination and unanimous vote, Jay Wojcik was appointed mayor and subsequently sworn in; he then chaired the remainder of the meeting. Tom McKee was nominated, seconded and sworn as deputy mayor.
On a single omnibus motion and unanimous voice vote the committee adopted a package of routine annual resolutions (01-2026, 02-2026 and 04-2026 through 16-2026). Key items approved included Resolution No. 01-2026, awarding one-year professional service contracts to specified vendors for 2026: Mark Roselli (municipal attorney); Donna Becker (municipal engineer); Jessica Caldwell (professional planner); Laura Atwell (auditor); Steve Rogut (bond counsel); Matt Bonaventura (insurance agent); Martin Allen (tax attorney); Victor DiSanto (appraiser); Kevin Zelinsky (tax map maintenance engineer); and Frank Covelli (health benefits consultant).
The committee also approved Resolution No. 02-2026 establishing the 2026 Temporary Municipal Budget. The resolution lists a temporary budget subtotal in the text as $1,717,422.79, with detailed line-item allocations for administration, public works, police, insurance, pensions and other accounts; a summary line elsewhere in the packet shows $1,717,200 (see clarifying details). The temporary budget was adopted to allow municipal operations pending final adoption of the 2026 municipal budget.
Other adopted measures included designation of official newspapers (Hunterdon Review and Star-Ledger); authorization of officials to sign municipal documents; a cash-management plan and designated depositories (including PNC, TD Bank, Northfield Bank and the New Jersey Cash Management Fund; the text also references Peapack/Peapack-Gladstone by name); establishment of petty cash and change funds; a $20 return-check fee; delinquent tax interest rates (8% on the first $1,500 of a delinquency and 18% on amounts above $1,500, with a 10-day grace period); authorization to cancel property tax balances of $5 or less; procedures for cancellation of redeemed tax sale certificates; authorization to submit the NJDEP recycling tonnage grant application and deposit any grant funds into a dedicated recycling trust; and authorization for the township clerk to process raffle applications for qualifying nonprofit organizations.
The committee also approved a slate of municipal appointments by resolution (17-2026 through 24-2026), including municipal court professionals under the Clinton-Lebanon shared services agreement and the reappointment of Diane Laudenbach as Certified Tax Collector for a four-year term beginning Jan. 1, 2026. The committee appointed Beverly Koehler as Fund Commissioner and Warren Gabriel as alternate for the Statewide Insurance Fund and named Groendyke Associates as the township’s risk management consultant for the fund year.
The meeting included two public comment periods; a member of the public provided a written handout concerning the Sunshine Law and the township form of government, and later public commenters raised the same topics plus questions about meeting dates and Library Advisory Board appointments. The committee entered an executive session to discuss pending or anticipated litigation identified as "NAR," citing the statutory basis for confidentiality; it reconvened and, by unanimous vote, appointed Koehler and Webb to a Statewide Insurance Issues Sub-Committee before adjourning at 7:37 p.m.
What happens next: the temporary budget enables township operations while the full 2026 municipal budget is finalized; the committee scheduled follow-up discussion of meeting dates at its Jan. 21 session.
