The 12th District Legislators are pleased to see progress in the resolution of the on-going pollution problem at Branchport Creek.
A meeting was held Monday night at Oceanport Borough Hall at which the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority discussed with the public its new plan to solve the run-off problem caused by Branchport Creek’s close proximity to Monmouth Park Racetrack. Senator Jennifer Beck, Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon and Assemblywoman Caroline Casagrande were in attendance.
“For the past two years,” said O’Scanlon, who has been working towards a solution since the problem was first recognized, “I, along with Senator Beck and Assemblywoman Casagrande, have been working very hard to find a feasible solution to this pollution problem. We have been working with the residents and the Borough of Oceanport, the people at Monmouth Park and the Two Rivers Water Reclamation Authority to stop the pollution at Branchport Creek that has been making that water unsafe for the past several years. I am hopeful that we’ve finally found a solution.”
The agreement that has been reached, and that was presented at Monday night’s meeting, includes having Oceanport acting as a conduit to borrow up to $22 million for upgrades from the New Jersey Environmental Infrastructure Trust, which will be repaid by the NJSEA on behalf of Oceanport Borough. The upgrades will entail a retention basin and pumping station, which will allow Monmouth Park to control the flow rate to the Two Rivers Water Reclamation Authority, and prevent run-off to Branchport Creek.
The four-year plan is expected to be complete by 2013, and although the residents are frustrated by this long process, steps have already begun to be taken. For instance, the flow of waste to the TRWRA has already been doubled for this racing season.
“Because of the planned retention basin and pumping station,” said Casagrande, “the former plan to hook up to the Long Branch Sewage Authority is no longer needed. Since the rate will be controlled, the LBSA doesn’t need to be involved. This has been a long road, with signs going up every year warning of the waste found in Branchport Creek. It will be a real success when we see those signs removed once and for all.”
“Racing is an important industry in New Jersey,” said Beck, “but not more important than the safety of our environment. We are fortunate to live in an area so close to so many bodies of water, and it is our responsibility to make sure that our industries and environment can exist together. It’s been a long road, and we still have a long way to go. The people of Oceanport have been so patient during this process. It’s nice to see movement forward.”
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One thing that I think is worth mentioning is that while just about all of the people who spoke at the meeting are/were unhappy with Monmouth Park's role in polluting the river, I believe it is more than safe to say that just about everyone who spoke at the meeting was equally upset and disappointed with the DEPs role, or lack thereof, in the process.
I do not believe that a single representative from the DEP was in attendance. (I could be mistake as I missed Steve Hildner from Holt's office in my recap of Monday's meeting but I don't recall Mayor Mahon mentioning anyone from DEP)
Anywho - point being - while MP, as a state run operation, has clearly failed We the People, I think that the bigger failure has been the state DEP. While MP surely deserved the beating they took from several in attendance, I'm also sure that MP took, and will continue to take, a beating that people really intend to direct their anger at the DEP.
Hopefully our next Gov, be it Christie or Lonegan, can clean up DEP because the department is, in the opinion of this AverageNoOne, a failure and a waste of taxpayer money, and Corzine has no intention of cleaning house in that department.
So let's see if we can see any difference between the candidates. The incumbent republicans in the 12th district have been working on Branchport Creek and many other projects, attacking the Democratic budget which is sending the state into a whirlpool of debt and self-destruction, working with constituents to resolve their individual problems with the State, working with various state and federal agencies to correct problems with health, the environment, traffic, housing, etc., have been honest enough to say that COAH is not working and is destroying our communities and have spent every day of the week working hard to improve the fourteen towns in this area. Running against them this year is a school teacher no one's ever heard from before and will never hear from again, and Michelle Roth, the Czar of Manalapan who raised taxes nearly 50% in two years, spent 50,000 dollars of taxpayers' money on a frivilous lawsuit seeking 10,000 against a political foe, purchased land partially owned by John Lynch for three times its value, contracted for and built a 1,000,000 artificial field that scientific studies all across the country had declared was unsafe for children and other living things, attacked a fellow township committeeman who happened to be Italian comparing him to the three Italian politicians of the eleven politicians of various ethnic identity picked up in Operation Bid Rig, followed by her husband going to the microphone to tell that same committeeman, "I hate Italians," fired the Asian orchestra conductor on trumped up charges, costing the taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars to keep the orchestra going without her, fired the award winning recreation director who was on a disability at the time, fired the administrator who was immediately hired by Marlboro, and replaced her with an amateur who has screwed up everything she touches, made her living on blood money writing pretty press releases saying how wonderful her gold mining companies were treating their African employees who were being housed 15 to a room, and writing pretty press releases about how wonderful her Arizona mining clients were treating the Native Americans whose land they were destroying. In Manalapan, she cost the taxpayers 10,000,000 in taxes to date by stopping a shopping mall that would have been competing with convicted felon John Lynch's mall down the road. Yeh, this is a real hard choice.
Not only is the comment from anonymous factually incorrect on almost every count, it is also the largest run on sentence I have ever seen in m y life.
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