Lots to catch up on this week, from new device rules kicking in for the new school year to a longtime local restaurateur’s next project. Here is what you need to know.
Montclair Schools Tighten Device Rules for the New Year
Montclair students return to school under a markedly different set of technology rules: no phones, smart watches or earbuds from the opening bell until dismissal. Superintendent Ruth B. Turner outlined the new bell-to-bell policy in an August 25 letter to families, replacing the district’s looser prior standard, which only required phones to be powered off and out of sight. Under the new K-8 rule, devices must be powered off and stored in a designated location for the entire instructional day. Montclair High School will have a bell-to-bell ban too, but building-level details are still coming because of the school’s open-campus structures. Read the Pod’s full report on Montclair’s bell-to-bell cell phone policy, which also covers the district’s broader pullback on Chromebook use in classrooms.
Scam Warning at South Fullerton Parking Deck
A woman told Montclair police she was approached by a man posing as a parking attendant before she parked at the South Fullerton Parking Deck on August 23. The man, described as wearing a black shirt and a traffic vest, told her parking cost $20 and instructed her to send payment through Apple Cash to a cellphone number. She paid, then later received a legitimate parking summons, alerting her to the scam.
Montclair High Football Opens Season With a Loss to Ridgewood
The Mounties opened their season Saturday at home against the Ridgewood Maroons at Woodman Field and lost, 42-7. Montclair actually scored first, and the crowd and team spirit were strong; new head coach Chris Singh is building a first-year program, and Ridgewood arrived fired up after learning just days before the game that its own stadium would be unusable all season, making every one of its games this year an away game. The opener capped a busy stretch at MHS: the school’s renovated auditorium also reopened this month, closing out a project tied to the 2022 bond referendum that ran well past its original January deadline, and the Gridiron Club built out a new Mountie Alumni Section for the season. Read the Pod’s preview of the football season, auditorium reopening and rankings boost for the full picture.
MPACT Report Examines What Makes a School Board Work Well
MPACT, the Montclair Partnership for Accountability, Clarity and Trust, published a report in July examining Board of Education governance, its third report following earlier work on transportation costs and the possibility of a state-appointed fiscal monitor. MPACT member Dan Hafetz discussed the findings with Mike on last week’s episode, arguing the board has swung between micromanagement and excessive deference over the years and should function more like it’s “on the balcony and not on the dance floor.” Hafetz credited district leadership for navigating this year’s financial crisis but said much of the board’s real scrutiny happens before public meetings rather than during them, calling it a “rubber stamp” problem when legitimate questions surface too late to act on. He also addressed the district’s forensic audit directly, saying it should determine “was there wrongdoing” beyond what the district’s regular audit already found, before the community moves on. Read the Pod’s full conversation with Hafetz on the board election and MPACT’s governance report. MPACT’s full report is available at mpactnj.org/boegovernance.
New Italian Steakhouse Cassaforte Coming to Bloomfield Avenue
Longtime local restaurateur Demetri Malki, owner of De Novo, is transforming the former Chase Bank building at 475 Bloomfield Avenue into Cassaforte, a casual Italian steakhouse, with an opening targeted for spring 2027, first reported by Montclair Girl’s Ashtyn Asay. Malki and his partners purchased the building in April 2025; renovations have been slowed by the bank’s roughly two-foot-thick, concrete-filled walls, which require a specialty crew every time an interior wall comes down. The project is a family-and-friends venture: Malki’s brother and cousin, who run De Novo’s Edgewater and Montclair locations, are partners, along with Robert Pantusa of Montclair’s La Rocca Osteria, who will run the kitchen. “We have all these different ethnic cuisines, but we didn’t have a steakhouse, so that’s where the idea came from,” Malki told Montclair Girl.
Image credit: Pexels/Katerina Holmes
