Lakewood and Jackson expand Chametz burning sites for upcoming Passover prep

LAKEWOOD – If you stop by the ShoreTown Ballpark on Monday, April 22, the focus will not be on bats and balls but a centuries-old religious ceremony involving fire, reverence and tradition.

The Jersey Shore BlueClaws home parking lot will be one of nine sites throughout the township where the annual Chametz burnings will take place to mark the beginning of Passover.

Between 7 a.m. and noon on April 22, the traditional burning of food items not deemed kosher for Passover will occur in dumpsters across town, officials said.

“Public works along with the fire department and emergency management have special safety precautions for the dumpsters,” said Mayor Ray Coles. “It is a natural outgrowth of the growth of the town."

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Township officials, who offered eight sites last year, added a ninth — at 173 Miller Road — this year to accommodate the growing population, and to ease traffic and crowds.

“It has always been a challenge to get it just right,” Coles said. “I think we have found the right number of burning sites, and educating the population about what should and should not go into the fire.”

Each year, Orthodox Jewish families throughout the world remove food items from kitchens that are barred by the Torah during the holiday week of Passover, which this year starts at sunset on April 22.

But before the holiday begins comes the burning of chametz, which is leavened bread and other banned items.

“The tradition is to burn it to get rid of it from our home, the burning of it is symbolic,” said Rabbi Aaron Kotler, president emeritus of Beth Medrash Govoa, the Lakewood-based Yeshiva. “The burning is the symbolism, the representation of the process of cleaning our homes of that. Passover is our time to go back to our roots, to remind ourselves of our time when we were slaves and then immersed in freedom.”

The other Lakewood locations include Patrick Park on Vine Street, D’zio Park at New Hampshire and Locust, Synagogue Khal Zichron Yaakon on Sunset Road, Pink Park on Country Club Drive, Frank Bartlof Park on Brook Road, as well as sites at Private Way and 7th Street, and Clifton Avenue and 9th Street.

The holiday week celebrates the liberation of Jewish people from slavery in ancient Egypt over 3,000 years ago. Back then, Jewish people escaped in such haste that there was no time to leaven the bread, observers said.

In commemoration of the historical event, Jewish families don’t eat or keep leavened products derived from wheat, spelt, barley, oats and rye. That means no bread, no pasta, no tortillas, cookies or any other product that can be leavened.

As the Orthodox population has grown in Lakewood in recent years, it has also expanded their presence in neighboring Toms River and Jackson, each of which has township-sponsored Chametz burnings.

“We are expanding to three sites from two last year,” said Jackson Township Councilman Mordechai Burnstein. “The fire department will oversee them and maintain safety.”

The Jackson locations include the Larson Road and Johnson Park firehouses, as well as a new site at 518 East Veterans Highway, Burnstein said.

Each will be operating from 8 a.m. to noon.

“There are a lot of people and there was traffic getting in and out of the other sites. There were too many people for one site,” Burnstein said about the reasons for expanding to a third location. “We want the traffic to flow smoothly, especially since one of the sites is near a public school. The community is growing.”

Toms River, which has at least 2,000 Orthodox families, will hold two Chametz burning locations, according to Booky Kaluszyner of the Toms River Jewish Community Council.

He said the sites will be at River Wood Park on Commons Way, and the Toms River Fire Academy at 1780 Church Road.

“The objective is so that people do not hold the fires in their own yards, for safety purposes so we want a controlled burn instead of people doing it for their own home,” Kaluszyner said. “River Wood can accommodate hundreds of cars. We never had an issue with it affecting traffic. We may add a third site in the future, but we feel it is sufficient."

Joe Strupp is an award-winning journalist with 30 years’ experience who covers education and several local communities for APP.com and the Asbury Park Press. He is also the author of three books, including Killing Journalism on the state of the news media, and an adjunct media professor at Rutgers University and Fairleigh Dickinson University. Reach him at [email protected] and at 732-413-3840. Follow him on Twitter at @joestrupp

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Lakewood, Jackson expand Chametz burning locations