#AIRMOUNT SHUL INSTALL#

“There is a concern because of what is happening one mile away, five miles away, six miles away,” Kostroun said, referring to Monsey and East Ramapo. In 2015, after accusations of mismanagement, the Board of Education there was placed under state oversight. She pointed to the example of the nearby New York town of East Ramapo, where members of a booming haredi community were elected to the local education board and passed deep cuts in funding for the public schools, which hardly any haredi children attend. Kostroun did acknowledge, however, that residents also were wary of how a growing haredi population might change the area’s character. But if you come to Mahwah, you do have to abide by the ordinances of the town.” “We’re very diverse, and very inclusive, and we want people to come to Mahwah. “If someone puts up a garage sale sign, it gets taken down,” said Deborah Kostroun, Mahwah Strong’s spokeswoman. If the Eruv Association obeyed the law, they say, there would be no problem. But activists say the problem is that the Eruv Asscoation bypassed the town while putting up the eruv and broke the signage ordinance. Local officials aren’t speaking to the media in light of the legal proceedings. And a new organization called Mahwah Strong, also against the eruv, has grown to around 3,000 members. In late July, 200 Mahwah residents gathered to protest the eruv. A petition opposing the eruv to “Protect the Quality of Our Community in Mahwah” has garnered 1,200 signatures. Mahwah residents, in addition to residents from the neighboring town of Upper Saddle River, have mobilized in opposition to the eruv and what - or who - it represents. 11, the Eruv Association filed a lawsuit against Mahwah, with Pinkasovits as a plaintiff, claiming that the demand to take down the lechis violates residents’ civil rights. But the Township of Mahwah claims the poles violate an ordinance that prohibits placing signs on the poles, and has threatened to issue summonses and demand that the poles be taken down. The Eruv Association says it obtained the necessary permits from the utility company that owns the telephone poles and installed the eruv under local police supervision. The Eruv Association pays for their upkeep. The pipes, called “lechis,” act as posts for the eruv.

#AIRMOUNT SHUL INSTALL#

Much of the eruv consists of existing telephone wires, but to make it kosher, the association had to install PVC pipes that reach from the bottom of the wire to the ground and are affixed to telephone poles. The Vaad HaEruv, or Eruv Association, expanded an eruv in the Monsey area around the beginning of July. “People will always say the worst when they are left without information.” “I think people are reacting out of the unknown,” said Vince Crandon, a Mahwah resident who claims the eruv was erected illegally. Others have worried that a growing haredi population will mean a large group of residents who don’t support services like the public school system. Residents of Mahwah, a New Jersey town southwest of Airmont, have complained that the eruv breaks town ordinances because supports that mark the boundary are attached to public utility polls. The eruv crosses into New Jersey towns adjacent to Airmont in order to accommodate the growing religious community and, while extending only a couple blocks over the border, has led to raucous debates, vandalism and a lawsuit. The battle has coalesced around the construction of an eruv - the artificial boundary that, according to Jewish law, allows Jews to push and carry objects outside their homes on the Sabbath and holy days. Like Pinkasovits, haredi Jews who moved to the towns say they just want to live their lives in a nice place, just like their non-Jewish neighbors.īut the haredi influx has led to friction with longtime residents. The towns - green, quiet and spread out - offer the large families spacious homes at an affordable price. Pinkasovits is part of a wave of haredi Orthodox Jews who have spread out from Monsey to the surrounding towns. I don’t mind living between them, but I also don’t mind if they leave and I get more Jewish neighbors.”

Wherever you look down the street, you see ‘for sale’ signs hanging. “People are moving here because this is how we want to live. “It’s going to die out,” Pinkasovits said of the anti-Semitism. Despite the abuse, he loves living in Airmont, “in my own house with my own backyard.” He hopes his non-Jewish neighbors will come to accept the new religious Jews in town.Īnd if they don’t? It’s only a matter of time before the Jews become a critical mass, Pinkasovits says.

Airmount shul