- [Narrator] Funding for this edition of One-On-One with Steve Adubato has been provided by Investors Bank.
Hackensack Meridian Health.
Keep getting better.
Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.
Here when you need us most, now and always.
The North Ward Center.
The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, Clean Energy program.
The New Jersey Economic Development Authority.
Choose New Jersey.
Fedway Associates, Inc. And by Eastern Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters.
Promotional support provided by Northjersey.com and Local IQ.
Part of the USA Today Network.
And by AM970 The Answer.
- This is One-On-One.
- I'm an equal American just like you are.
- The jobs of tomorrow are not the jobs of yesterday.
- I'm hopeful that this is the beginning to accountability.
- Life without dance is boring.
- I don't care how good you are or how good you think you are, there is always something to learn.
- I did do the finale, and guess where my trailer was?
A block away from my apartment, it couldn't have been better!
- People call me 'cause they feel nobody's paying attention.
_ It's not all about memorizing and getting information, it's what you do with that information.
- (slowly) Start talking right now.
- That's a good question, high five.
(upbeat music) - Hi, I'm Steve Adubato.
Once again, by popular demand, we have back our good friends from Montclair Film.
Evelyn McGee Colbert, President of Montclair Film, and Bob Feinberg, Founder and Chairman of Montclair Film.
Great to have both of you.
- Thank you for having us.
- Evie, is it my mistake that one of us looks especially tan and relaxed?
- (laughs) Well certainly not me, not either tan or relaxed.
- Hey listen, I'm Italian and I get tan, but it's, we're doing this right at the holidays.
Bob Feinberg's on vacation but he's so committed to Montclair Film and doing this that he took his time to be with us.
Welcome.
All right, enough of that.
- Thank you.
- Evie, talk to us, as we do this program at the end of 2021, seen in 2022, how excited are you, and I'll ask Bob the same question, about the future of Montclair Film?
We'll talk about some of the challenges you've had as well.
- Very excited.
We had a wonderful festival in October, we're back in, were back in person.
We had COVID requirements but people came back, they felt safe, it was incredibly moving to be back sharing the experience of watching film together in person with people.
Today, we've had some exciting news in that the Golden Globe nominees were announced and many of the films are films that we showed during our festival, so we're feeling very happy about that.
- Congratulations.
- Yeah, it's exciting, and during the festival we reopened the Clairidge Theater, which was a independent movie theater basically across the street from our headquarters on Bloomfield Avenue in Montclair, we renovated it and opened it and we now run it 365 days a year as an independent movie theater.
So that's super exciting, - A lot going on.
- a lot going on, yeah.
- Yeah, and Bob, my wife and I were at that opening of the, which is around the corner from our home.
It's an iconic, important theater, the Clairidge, and to see Montclair Film take it over and doing what you're doing is extraordinary.
Bob, tell folks not just about the great things going on, but some of the challenges Montclair Film's, Montclair Film has faced, and particularly around, I mean the hurricanes were terrible.
- Yeah, the Hurricane Ida was terrible, and Evie mentioned our headquarters at 505 Bloomfield Avenue, the Investors Bank Film & Media Center.
This is an old bank building that we rehabilitated about five years ago and created educational space and exhibition space and offices, and during the most recent hurricane, we had about five feet of water in our education concourse, so on top of the pandemic, we set about rebuilding that space, and that's an ongoing project.
We've done the demo, we're reimagining how we're gonna utilize that space.
We had, luckily we had insurance.
Less luckily, the insurance is not gonna cover all of our expenses and we've seen a great outpouring of support from the community to help us get that space up and running.
We've launched, as Evie mentioned, the Clairidge Theater, which is an iconic art house movie theater in Montclair, been there for decades, shut at the beginning of the pandemic, and we took it over and spent a number of months renovating the space.
If you haven't been there in a long time, you should come see it.
It looks beautiful, and we've invested a lot of time and energy making sure that it's COVID-safe.
Of course, it's a challenge bringing people back to the movie theater.
We think they're gonna come back, we're seeing them coming back, but we're in it for the long haul.
Last, this is our 10th anniversary, this festival that we just had, celebrated the 10th anniversary of Montclair Film, so we're really launching our second 10 years, and we have a number of projects going on to help that launch.
- Evie, talk to us about this membership.
Beyond the films, beyond the film festival, the educational programs are terrific, and that's just a piece of what's going on.
Tell people why membership to Montclair Film is so valuable, as we put up the information.
- Sure, sure, well one of the things that's really interesting is you're, the Montclair Film membership has become more valuable with the Clairidge.
Our members receive discounted price, ticket prices, and we even have I think a promotion going where you get one or two films free when you become a member, so it's a great time to become a member of Montclair Film, but in addition to being a member of the Clairidge and being able to see movies, it supports, as you mentioned, our education programs.
So we are really bullish and hopeful to expand what we do in the education field.
Now that we have the Clairidge, we can have a little bit more space, once we renovate, once we get back into our headquarters, we'll be able to do a little bit more with education, and we also hope to move our education program into schools themselves.
We have a program running right now in Newark in a school.
We hope to duplicate that, do more of that, so membership is a great way to support all of our efforts.
It's a, we're a real community organization, so being a part of something exciting in Montclair, and regardless of whether you live in Montclair, in Northern New Jersey, New York, it's a great reason to join.
- Yeah, it was packed in October.
You could tell there wasn't just, there weren't just folks from Montclair, they were from all over.
Bob, lemme ask you, as you and Evie on the team and Tom Hall and the great staff at Montclair Film keep things running, you're not exactly sure what the situation is gonna be in the spring.
This, again, we'll be seeing this program, be seen in the beginning of 2022, how do you prepare for a festival that's largely indoor, outdoor, lots of different things, but we don't know about where we'll be with the pandemic?
How do you strategically plan?
- Yeah, that's a great question, and-- - Don't say carefully.
(both laugh) - Well, we did that when the pandemic hit, right, in 2020, we were scheduled to have our festival, what was gonna be the ninth festival, in May of that year, and it had been in May every year, and the pandemic hit in March and we postponed and we ultimately did a, largely a virtual festival in October of 2020, and we did some live stuff, this is New Jersey of course so we had some drive-in movies that Essex County gave us space for near the Turtle Back Zoo, but it was mainly virtual, and we decided among other things that we were gonna keep the festival in October, so we have a little more breathing room in that the 11th festival will be in the second part of October of 2022, but we're gonna do what everybody else is doing, Steve, we're gonna watch what's happening, we're gonna follow the science, we're gonna focus on the safety of our audiences and our exhibitors, and as Evie mentioned, we've got an incredible staff that has really pivoted a number of times from live to virtual, to our building at 505 to other locations after the hurricane, and we think we're gonna, this is the new normal, right?
We're gonna have to continue responding.
The good thing is, there's a tremendous interest in what we do, and we've seen that continue through all of these challenges, and we wanna be there for our audiences and we're gonna be there.
- And bottom line from our perspective is not only, it's not only Montclair Film, it's public broadcasting, Bob knows well as the chief legal counsel at WNET and with our partners are the folks at NJ PBS, and Evie understands this also in your home, I'm sure your husband, Stephen, they are adapting and evolving, have from day one.
And we've seen the show as fans of it.
So final words, Evie, or, adapting and evolving, not an option, it's just part of being in the arts.
- Yeah, well I think that's true.
I mean, flexibility is the name of the game, and I think while we're bullish about the future, we're also fiscally very conservative, so we budget three different ways, scenario one, scenario two, scenario three, and then we see which one we get, and we take it as it comes, but I think cautiously optimistic is the way we might proceed.
(laughs) Right?
(indistinct speaking) - Evie, Bob, absolutely, Evie and Bob, thank you so much.
We wish you and the team at Montclair Film all the best, and we're gonna do everything we can on our end to make sure we let people know about the important things going on and how they can access it.
All the best, Bob and Evie, appreciate it.
I'm Steve-- - Thank you Steve.
- Thank you, that's Evie, that's Bob, I'm Steve, we'll be right back.
- [Narrator] To watch more One on One with Steve Adubato find us online and follow us on Social media.
- We are honored to be joined by Ralph Izzo, who is President and Chairman and CEO of PSEG.
I want to thank you so much for joining us, Ralph.
- Good to be here.
Thanks again for having me, Steve.
- Listen Ralph, we've had so many discussions about climate change and putting things in perspective, but internationally you participated in the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, back in the fall.
We're taping this at the end of 2021.
What was the biggest message from that United Nation Conference, that the rest of us should know about?
- The biggest message by far was that the entire planet is headed in one direction.
The policy arrow is to decarbonize our economies, our energy sector.
Now different countries are going to do that at a different pace, but the leaders are recognizing that the whole basis for their future economies are predicated on building and developing technologies that are less carbon intensive and in fact, carbon free.
- So let me ask you, we've had Joe Fiordaliso, the President of the BPU on.
We've had a whole range of people talking about this.
Governor Murphy's energy master plan.
Question, even if New Jersey implemented the energy master plan and did it to the tee, which is complicated because there's opposition, questions, et cetera.
New Jersey can't do this alone.
I not here making a statement, but it seems obvious.
We can't do this alone.
Ralph.
- No, that's true, Steve.
Let me first point out, that New Jersey with 9 million people, is bigger than many of the countries that were at COP26.
So we're not inconsequential.
But this notion that no country can do it alone or no state can do it alone, while it's scientifically accurate, it misses a very important point.
Take China as an example, they are not gonna achieve net zero until 2060, but that doesn't keep them from having the largest electric vehicle fleet in the world.
The greatest number of solar panels in the world, the number two exporter of nuclear technology, the number one builder of electrified mass transportation.
They are developing the skills, the products and services that are helping them grow their economy.
Look at off-shore wind on the east coast of the United States.
Who are the dominant players?
Orsted from Copenhagen, Denmark.
Shell, Royal Dutch Shell.
Equinor from Norway.
Why?
Are they're engineers better than ours?
Of course not.
They've been at it for 10 years.
So it's really an economic imperative to start to embrace these targets, so that we can develop the technologies and the businesses that can be the winners in the future.
- Let me do this for PSE&G, to disclose, an underwriter, not only of what we do, but also of our partners at NJ PBS and "Spotlight News."
For your company, how much can any individual utility drive this, versus government policy from the federal/state level?
And I know it's a combination.
But how much can you drive this?
You and your colleagues at PS?
- So we cannot, we are heavily regulated company, as you know and we need the Board of Public Utility approval to do things, but New Jersey has a phenomenal energy master plan.
That is quite ambitious in the carbon reduction.
So as a result, we are able to invest a billion dollars in energy efficiency.
Lowering carbon while lowering people's bills.
We are able to keep our nuclear plants alive, avoiding 13 million tons of carbon a year into the atmosphere.
We are able to invest in 25% worth of an offshore wind farm, that should be commercial within two years.
So there are things that we are able to do because we're following the lead of the Murphy Administration and the board of public utilities.
But absent that leadership, we would be handcuffed.
- Now help me out.
I may have made a mistake on this.
The goal for net zero carbon emissions, is it by 2030 or 2050?
- Well, so it's by 2030.
For what we directly or indirectly emit.
It's by 2050, for those things that our customers emit by virtue of using our natural gas.
So they have terminology, scope one and scope two is what we directly produce and scope three is what our customers produce.
So the stuff we directly control, we're gonna eliminate by 2030.
The stuff that we don't directly control, we're gonna try and eliminate by 2050.
- Do you have much patience, particularly given the international experience you had at the UN in Glasgow, Scotland.
Do you have much patience, A and B how do you deal with either full-blown climate change deniers or those who say, "Come on, you're making too much of this" and those of us in the media are only making it worse by engaging in hyperbole?
You say what?
- Well, first of all, fortunately they're a shrinking and almost extinct group of people.
What I would say to them is did you notice the heat wave in the Pacific Northwest?
Have you noticed the fact that every year we have the worst wildfires we've ever experienced before in California?
Have you noticed the deep freeze in Texas?
Have you noticed tornadoes in the mid-Atlantic region?
Things that were just never experienced before?
If you need any more proof than those events, that climate change is real.
I don't know that you'll ever be convinced.
But fortunately, the world isn't waiting for the climate deniers.
The beauty of COP26, was that the businesses there, NGO- - Yeah that was the United Nations Conference in Scotland.
Go ahead.
What's called a COP26.
Go ahead.
I'm sorry.
- There were investors there.
There were financial services companies there.
There were equipment manufacturers and their message was consistent.
We're not waiting for government to act.
We're pushing this envelope.
I forget the exact number, Steve, but there's like $30 trillion of assets under management for folks that have what are called environmentally, socially or governance sophisticated operations.
ESG companies.
In my industry, if you have strong ESG credentials.
And the biggest part of the E is environment, which is all about climate change.
You're valued at 10 to 20% higher than other companies.
So investors are demanding this.
Our youth is demanding this.
Many of our customers are demanding this.
So if there's still a small group of folks denying it, they are shrinking.
- Ralph I've got about a little less than a minute left.
So Ida, all the way back to Sandy, as we do this program at the end of 2021, the horrible situation in multiple states, dealing with, including Oklahoma, now with a tornado and a whole range of other... the wildfires out west.
Climate change.
They're just not happening.
It's climate change, big part of that.
- So it's upon us.
That's exactly right.
And while I'd love to talk about what we can do to avoid the worst of the future, the reality is we've already put enough carbon in the atmosphere that we're feeling the impact, now.
Fortunately, New Jersey has allowed us to invest in our infrastructure to adapt to it to a certain extent.
So we've improved for example, 26 substations.
That's the equipment you see that receives electricity from power plants and then distributes it to our customers.
During Ida not one of those 26 substations was flooded.
That wasn't the case during Irene and Sandy and some of our earlier storms.
So some of the adaptation measures we've taken have been highly successful at helping us keep the lights on for customers.
- Big connection.
And we'll talk about this in another segment.
Big connection between climate change and infrastructure policy and the intersection of the two, Ralph Izzo, who's the Chairman, President and CEO of PSEG, thank you so much for joining us.
We appreciate it, Ralph.
- Thanks for having me, Steve.
- You got it.
Stay with us.
We'll be right back.
- [Narrator] To watch more One on One with Steve Adubato find us online and follow us on Social media.
- We're now joined by Dr. Atam Dhawan, Senior Vice Provost for Research and Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at NJIT, New Jersey Institute of Technology.
Good to see you, Doctor.
- Great to be with you, Steve.
Thank you so much for inviting me.
- You got it.
Let me ask you, the Port Newark Container Terminal, what is it and why does it matter?
- So Port Newark Container Terminal is a very specialized maritime port facility, and it primary deals with the container shipping and transport services.
It is the largest container port on the East Coast, and the third largest in the nation.
- What kind of impact are we talking about in terms of jobs and the economy?
- So these terminals, they play a very critical role in the global logistics and supply chain industry.
And you can imagine that they can impact greatly the commerce, trade, manufacturing, retail businesses, and almost everything around us, because they supply the very importantly needed goods for this industry and the consumer market.
So whenever there is any problem with these port operations in transporting the goods, there is a direct impact on supply chain management, and that slows down the commerce and trade, and affects the availability of goods in the market, leading to the rise in consumer prices.
It also leads to negatively impacting the national GDP, because if there are not goods available for the manufacturing, then you cannot manufacture what you tend to manufacture.
- Doctor, let me follow up on this.
And to make it clear, NJIT is one of our higher-ed university partners.
And I want to also understand something.
There's a lot of talk about supply chain, supply chain problems.
And you live this, you research it, you understand it.
For those of us in the Northeast, particularly New Jersey, New York, where our primary audience is, particularly in New Jersey.
When people are talking about what's going on on the West Coast, in California, and high percentage, 1/3 plus of all of the incoming, it's that port.
It's not our port, it's that port.
Are we affected by both ports?
- We're affected by all the ports.
So Northeastern port is a gateway to the Northern region of the United States.
So just to tell you that the transportation, distribution, and the logistics industry, in 2019, provided $67 billion contribution to the state GDP.
And it is the sixth highest amount per state nationwide.
So, you know, for example, New Jersey is the bio-pharma manufacturing and the life sciences industry sector as one of the top industry sectors over here.
So whenever there is a disruption in the supply chain, all the industry sectors are affected.
So the goods are not coming, the ingredients for manufacturing, they are not available.
So... Everything.
Whatever is the industry for manufacturing, the goods from renewable energy or biofuel, to anything that supplies, including the manufacturing processes for bio-pharma or medical devices, or innovations associated with it, they are all effected.
- So let me ask you, there's an initiative here.
The Economic Development Authority in New Jersey had a competition.
Put this in perspective as succinctly as possible.
There were four regional coalitions for the $1 billion Build Back Better Challenge.
Now $1 billion... And I believe NJIT won this with the city of Newark.
What did you win?
How much money?
And way more importantly, what could that potentially mean in terms of the issues we're talking about right now?
- So the $1 billion competition- - Wait, you didn't win, you're a finalist?
Did I get ahead of myself?
- Well, we won the Phase 1 $500,000 grant.
So this is the Phase 1 competition of the $1 billion Build Back Better Regional Challenge.
So the total competition is for $1 billion.
It is divided into two phases.
The Phase 1 is a planning grant, and it is awarded to 60... - Respectfully, Doctor, we can't get into the details of the process.
It's broken up across the country, and NJIT and the City of Newark won a grant to achieve what?
- To put together a complete proposal for Phase 2 grant, which is going to be $100 million.
And this is to optimize the Port of New York New Jersey facilities located in Newark and Elizabeth, as well as the transportation system extending from the hub, to support job growth, equity, and economic development in the region and the state to continue to increase its contribution to the national GDP.
So in nutshell, this money is awarded to us in order to put together a complete technology, innovation, development, and translation to the deployment of the port, so that we can improve its efficiency, capacity, and provide the job growth to the connected businesses.
- Dr. Dhawan, I want to thank you.
Complex, but important stuff that matters to us greatly, particularly in this region.
Thank you Doctor, appreciate it.
- Thank you so much.
- I'm Steve Adubato.
Thank you so much for watching.
We'll see you next time.
- [Narrator] One-On-One with Steve Adubato has been a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.
Funding has been provided by Investors Bank.
Hackensack Meridian Health.
Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.
The North Ward Center.
The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, Clean Energy program.
The New Jersey Economic Development Authority.
Choose New Jersey.
Fedway Associates, Inc. And by Eastern Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters.
Promotional support provided by Northjersey.com and Local IQ.
Part of the USA Today Network.
And by AM970 The Answer.
The essence of the North Ward Center is ingrained in our values, thoughts, and actions.
What began as a storefront on Bloomfield Avenue has evolved into a life-changing community nonprofit.
The mansion is steeped in tradition, but with all of its grandeur, the true essence of the North Ward Center is in the people we serve.
So as the North Ward Center commemorates 50 years of service, let's also celebrate the many opportunities yet to come.