Will, George and Charlie

"Anyway, with so many bad numbers I had to assume (and probably still do, given your intention to dismiss it as a "very minor error") that someone was deliberately trying to confuse the numbers." Stan Katz

Best4WestWindsor

Stan Katz responds to an email from Hillier Architecture reflected in the April 17, 2007 Trenton Times article:

"Thanks for the update. However, calling it a 'very minor error' is, in my opinion, not going to get you very far, because 1) the error is a factor of 10, which makes it quite major, I would think, and 2) someone is sure to mention that the 2.6 per household number for Washington Township makes no sense either. This [sic]were not simple typos, because Bob used '3 per 100' and then 'a total of 30'; it was a very large error, compounded by a third bogus number, the Washington Township 2.6 per household.

"It seems quite unlikely that there was a simple error in that paragraph, because there were at least 3 sets of numbers that had to be wrong. First, if the number should have been 30 per 100, then the TV total would have been 300 (the part that you are now correcting here). But also, he compared it to 'Washington Township's 2.6 children per household', which makes no sense at all. Should that have been 2.6 per 10 households, certainly a strange way to say it, producing a comparable 26 per 100? Even our most school-oriented single-family developments produce 'only' 1.5-1.6 students per individual household! So where did the 2.6 come from? Maybe 26 per 100 for townhouses, or 0.26 per unit.

"Anyway, with so many bad numbers I had to assume (and probably still do, given your intention to dismiss it as a "very minor error") that someone was deliberately trying to confuse the numbers. And since ... Bob ... had been trying for quite some time to convince me that the Rutgers Study numbers were usable in WW, this obfuscation looked like a deliberate attempt to reintroduce those low numbers, to which I strenuously objected (and still do).

"Hillier is currently in a public relations battle with much of West Windsor's public over the size of the transit village, and calling an error which reduced the student forecast from 300 to 30 a 'very minor error' is hardly going to get you much credit. As noted above, this was not a typo, because Bob used '3 per 100' and then 'a total of 30'; it was a very large error, compounded by its juxtaposition to an obviously wrong Washington Township 2.6 per household.

"I appreciate your copying me on this email, but I really don't think that you're going far enough to undo the damage that the statements made by labelling it a 'very minor error'."

Email to Bradley Walters, Hillier Architecture, from Stan Katz, April 16, 2007.

"I wanted to write you to let you know that Bob made a very minor error in his numbers when we spoke with you the other day, but his minor mis-statement has led to some much larger mis-understandings.  Bob was quoted as saying the units "would produce approximately 3 children per 100 units" for a total of 30.  In fact, the number is 3 children in every 10 units, or a total of 300.  This ratio is consistent with the recommendations made by Stan Katz at the beginning of our work.  As you will recall, all of the four options we previously presented showed between 300 and 350 schoolchildren.

"Please note that we continue to use Stan's numbers for all projections, as we believe they are the most applicable for West Windsor.  We are evaluating our concept plans with both his ratios of new students per housing unit and with his evaluations of capacity within the school district.  The quote that he provided below is consistent with our understanding as well.

"Please accept our apologies for this error.  Let me know what we can do to help remedy this for your readers."

Email to Joyce Persico, Trenton Times, from Bradley Walters, Hillier Architecture, April 16, 2007.