Community Corner

Barber to Be Memorialized By Honorary Street Name Change

Main Street in Bloomingdale to be honorarily renamed Frank the Barber Boulevard.

Main Street, Bloomingdale, will soon go by a new name as the street is being honorarily changed to Frank the Barber Boulevard in honor of , the 79-year-old barber who was in his Main Street shop, Frank's Barber Shop, in April. 

While police continue to search for in the case, Al Gallagher waited to hear back from the Passaic County engineer about whether the borough could change the name of the street. During a council meeting Tuesday, Mayor Jon Dunleavy said that the county agreed to changing the name honorarily and that the Passaic County Freeholders passed a resolution allowing it.

Gallagher said he wrote the letter about three weeks ago. Once he heard back that the borough was able to do the honorary name change, he began looking into the costs of signage and decided the signs should be blue and white.

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"I had seen them in a couple of towns," he said, adding that he had heard that the colors blue and white remind people of angels.

The signs will be placed above the existing street signs.

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The borough will be purchasing six signs to be placed on Ryerson Avenue, Reeve Avenue, Van Dam Avenue, Union Avenue, Leary Avenue and Wallace Avenue. A seventh sign will be given to the family, along with a copy of the letter Gallagher wrote to the county and a copy of the resolution approved by the Freeholders.

Dunleavy told the council about the cost of the signs, about $315, and asked the council to make a motion to approve payment for the signs to come out of the borough's general fund.

"I would ask that we find a way to make this happen," the mayor said.

But before a motion could be made, Councilman Glenn Schiffman offered for the money to be taken out of his own council salary. Dunleavy thanked Schiffman for the generous offer.

Dunleavy said the signs will be unveiled during a ceremony in June.


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