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The next hearing for the warehouse that is planned to replace the Nabisco factory in Fair Lawn will be moved to July.

A hearing on the proposal by Greek Development was supposed to be heard on June 19, which is Juneteenth. During the board’s Monday meeting, however, Planning Board President Ari Ludzki said the board plans to carry the application to the July 17 meeting.

The board is legally required to hold a short special meeting on June 19 to officially announce that it will be carrying the application to July, Ludzki said.

He said during the Monday meeting that when he was asked to schedule the meeting for June 19, he had done it after seeing the borough calendar, which said Fair Lawn was recognizing Juneteenth on Friday, not Monday. However, since the Planning Board has a new attorney and Juneteenth is a designated holiday, the board will not be meeting on that date, Ludzki said.

Greek Development plans to replace the cookie factory with 644,000 square feet of warehouse space and 10,000 square feet of office space. The project would include 256 parking spaces and would not require the borough to approve any variances. The developer's engineer said during a hearing in early May that he anticipates there won't be "any significant traffic impacts" and that in fact there would be a drastic reduction in volume from the old cookie factory.

Mondelēz International Inc., the Chicago-based parent company of Nabisco, sold the 40-acre site for $146.5 million in 2021 to a limited liability company tied to Greek Development.

Community members, especially Glen Rock residents who live on the Fair Lawn border near the old bakery, had become increasingly vocal about contamination risks from a planned implosion of the factory over the last few months. Many signed a petition asking for additional testing and expressed frustration with the communication and information coming from local leaders.

Greek Development decided to cancel a planned implosion of the building in May after hearing the concerns of the community and is planning to take down the building with an “alternative method” that does not include explosives.

An unofficial New Jersey town landmark that had been slated for implosion in a week and a half has gotten a reprieve.

The Nabisco plant in Fair Lawn, which filled the air with the delectable smell of baked cookies for 60 years before it was shut down in 2021, was scheduled to be imploded on Saturday, April 15. That is no longer the case, officials say.

They don't have a new date set for the implosion, either, though Fair Lawn officials indicated the change was merely a postponement. The nearly 40-acre site was expected to be razed to build a warehouse, NorthJersey.com reported.

Why the delay? It's unclear, but the mayor of Fair Lawn said that the controversy surrounding the implosion was not a factor in the decision to postpone.

According to Fair Lawn, the contractor performing the implosion said a state regulation prevents demolitions if the impact would be exacerbated by certain meteorological conditions that create "a low ceiling," like fog or cloud cover. It said it would track the weather five days in advance, flag any potential concerns and reschedule if necessary.

The owner of Greek Development, which bought the 40-acre site, said that the safety of workers and surrounding community are of utmost concern. Residents will be notified two weeks prior before the implosion is rescheduled.

All that said, Fair Lawn announced the sudden postponement on Wednesday, a full 10 days before the planned blast on April 15 at 8 a.m. blast. No other details were immediately provided.

The massive site on Route 208 has been a part of the landscape for as long as some folks can remember.

Hundreds of people working for the company were out of a job when it closed a few years back. The demolition started last fall, according to NJ.com, but this big boom was expected to be among the more disruptive components.

The tower over the factory with the giant red NABISCO letters was supposed to be part of the implosion, which drew extensive public interest for multiple reasons. Some people just wanted to watch.

Police said Thursday that won't happen, whenever a new date is set. Construction crews have been dismantling the tower for several weeks now and have made considerable progress, so much so that the mayor of Fair Lawn told NBC New York by phone that the size of the implosion could be scaled back some.

The general public is asked to avoid the area surrounding the property on the yet-to-be-determined new implosion date. Road closures will be in place that day.

In the lead-up, residents had expressed concerns about air quality and potential soil and water contamination, and one school district had planned to close the following Monday out of an abundance of caution. Several hundred people who live nearby signed a petition demanding more information about the potential health, safety and environmental impacts of the implosion.

The contractor says air monitoring is part of its protocol. It said it also follows state rules around waste removal and hazardous material and has noise and seismic monitoring in place for additional protective measures.

Fair Lawn officials say more information will be released as it becomes available.

The planned implosion of a long-standing New Jersey factory, an unofficial town landmark that imbued the air with baked cookie smells for six decades before it closed in 2021, has been scrapped due to staunch community opposition, the developer at the center of the project confirmed Monday.

The Nabisco tower in Fair Lawn will still come down, says construction company Greek Development, which bought the 40-acre site off Route 2018 for $146.5 million a few years back. It'll just take longer -- and it won't be as loud.

"After extensive dialogue with local communities and businesses, Greek Development has made the decision not to implode the remaining portion of the Nabisco Tower," David Greek, managing partner, said in a statement. "We will utilize an alternative method of demolition that does not include the use of any explosives."

"Ownership is proceeding to undertake the additional time and expense to ensure the well-being and peace of mind of the surrounding residents," he added.

The news dropped hours before a scheduled Fair Lawn Planning Board meeting at which town officials confirmed the future of the site would be discussed. That discussion only applied to what will replace the Nabisco Tower when it officially comes down, as the Board has jurisdiction only over the development proposal, not the demolition.

It's the latest demolition day for a tower that was supposed to be imploded in mid-April. Last month, it was abruptly postponed, according to the official township announcement, with no real public indication as to why or next steps.

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Nabisco Tower Won't Be Imploded After All

The implosion of the former Nabisco plant has been scrapped in Fair Lawn.

The massive site on Route 208 has been a part of the landscape for as long as some folks can remember.

The demolition started last fall, but this big boom was expected to be among the more disruptive components. As the scheduled blast approached, residents expressed concerns about air quality and potential soil and water contamination. One school district announced closure plans out of an abundance of caution.

Several hundred people who live nearby also signed a petition demanding more information about the potential health, safety and environmental impacts of the implosion. Greek Development says the safety of residents and its workers has and remains its top priority. It's not clear how long it might take to tear the tower down now.

Fair Lawn officials say more information will be released as it becomes available.

The Fair Lawn Board of Education has hired the current superintendent of the Ramapo Indian Hills school district to lead the district in the coming school year.

The school board unanimously voted during a special Tuesday meeting to hire Rui Dionisio as the new superintendent. He will begin his term in Fair Lawn on Nov. 1 under a contract that lasts until June 30, 2028.

“I am very grateful for all of you to put your trust in me with the district direction, to work with the team and to be able to build upon the success that you’ve established,” Dionisio said.

He said it was “satisfying and rewarding” to learn more about the “vibrant, diverse community culture and the close-knit feel of the schools” during the interview process. With each passing interview over the last few weeks, he said, he felt that Fair Lawn aligned with who he is as an educator.

“Your commitment well ahead of the curve on social-emotional learning and mental health is something to celebrate and be extremely proud of,” Dionisio said.

Dionisio will be paid an annual salary of $265,000 for the 2023-2024 school year. Starting July 1 and each July after, he will receive a 2% raise, according to the contract.

Dionisio has served as superintendent of the 2,300-student, two-high school Ramapo Indian Hills district, serving students in grades nine to 12 from Franklin Lakes, Oakland and Wyckoff, since November 2021.

Previously, Dionisio was a Ridgewood schools administrator and was superintendent of Verona Public Schools from 2014 to 2021. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Montclair State University and a doctorate from Seton Hall University.

Local:Fair Lawn is offering free trees to borough residents this fall. Here's how to get one

Dionisio’s term at Ramapo Indian Hills has been turbulent, with a board first divided over approaches to COVID masking and vaccinations.

In January, a five-member parents’ rights majority took office, making Judith Sullivan the board president. Since January, the district has lost two attorneys and its business administrator as the two board factions disagreed at every meeting. By February, the majority had overturned six of nine discipline recommendations made by Dionisio. Most recently, the majority stalled approval of Dionisio’s recommendation to continue a 13-year student mental health program.

Fair Lawn has been searching for a superintendent since Nicholas Norcia stepped down on July 23 to become superintendent at the Morris Hills Regional District in Morris County.

Fair Lawn school board President Ron Barbarulo thanked the search firm Strategic Educational Advantage and his fellow board members for coming together to find the best candidate for their community.

“We worked together hand and hand,” Barbarulo said. “We worked together, all nine of us. It’s something that I’m very proud of.”

Sullivan, of Ramapo Indian Hills, could not be immediately reached for comment on Dionisio's departure.