Secaucus Mayor Michael Gonnelli says that officials are working hard to make sure a graduation occurs this year in light of Gov. Phil Murphy (D) announcing that in-person high school and college graduations can occur starting July 6th.
“This is the first year that we printed banners up for our high school graduates and it’s something that we felt had to be done. So if you take a ride around, you’re gonna see a banner of each child up on the pole. It’s 180 banners in total,” Gonnelli said in a video released on Vimeo Tuesday.
“We’re working closely with our police department, our public works department, to make sure that a graduation occurs.”
Earlier this month, Murphy indicated that graduations would have to be conducted virtually to comply with social distancing rules to help slow the spread of COVID-19, but he reversed course earlier this week, though he hasn’t said what capacity restrictions will be for these events.
On May 18th, the Secaucus Board of Education released a statement indicating that while they were preparing for a virtual graduation, they had a contingency plan in place in case state regulations changed.
“In these uncertain times, many districts have turned to holding a virtual graduation ceremony,” the school district began.
“Please know, although our district is preparing for a virtual event at this time, our Board of Education and Administrative Team are also preparing for a “social distanced†ceremony as well for our high school seniors, should the Governor lift or ease his executive orders to allow this. We are committed, as a community, to properly celebrating the Class of 2020!!”
In the same video (embedded above), Gonnelli noted that there has been a total renovation at Schmidt’s Woods Park – which includes outdoor workout equipment available for public use – and that he expects the public pool to open soon.
