Ask Your Freeholders: New Open-Space Grant

Got a problem and need an answer from Camden County government? We’ve got your solution. 

Ask Your Freeholders is a weekly feature from Gloucester Township Patch in which you get to ask questions and get them answered here every week by the Board of Chosen Freeholders of Camden County—the county's highest body of elected officials.

Just send your questions to Haddonfield Patch editor Bill Duhart at bill.duhart@patch.com or ask it in our comment box below the story, and we’ll take the first three every week and get one of the seven freeholders to personally answer your question for this column.

Here are this week's questions:

From Haddonfield Patch: The county recently received an $800,000 grant from the state for open-space purchases. Many in Haddonfield hope at least some of the funds can be used to acquire open space in the anticipated redevelopment of the 18.7-acre Bancroft property. Will a municipality need to find matching funds to use any of the $800,000 grant the county recently received for open-space purchases?  

Answer from Freeholder Director Louis Cappelli Jr.:

Yes. Should the county use this money for any project, the $800,000, which is not yet appropriated, will require 75 percent matching funds from non-Green Acres sources from the town, the county, the state or other parties.

From Collingswood Patch: Why doesn't the Camden County Board of Elections post live results from school board elections on its website, as a convenience to residents? Other counties, such as Cumberland, have been doing this for several years.

Answer from Freeholder Director Louis Cappelli Jr.: These local school district election results come in too late for us to post in time for newspaper deadlines—they come in well after midnight and beyond. We always post them the next morning once we get the unofficial results (minus the counting of the paper ballots such as provisional ballots) from the clerk’s office and the superintendent of elections office. We get them aggregated as a group once all district results are tabulated.

For the primary elections and November elections, we do manage to publish the unofficial results by 11 p.m., when they are available on the county website, www.camdencounty.com.