Update on Defend NJ Waterways Campaign

by Dena Mottola

(from Jersey Coast Anglers Association June 2001 Newsletter)

The members of the Defend New Jersey’s Waterways Campaign have been hard at work making clean water policies a top priority for this year’s gubernatorial candidates.  The issue of clean water, which many New Jerseyans care about, has the potential to make a significant impact on a Governor’s race, considering that the typical New Jersey statewide election is incredibly close -- 3 of the last 5 gubernatorial elections have been decided by less than 30,000 votes.   

In March, NJPIRG and campaign partners released The New Jersey Watershed Health Report Card, which documents that New Jersey has the most polluted and most threatened waterways in the nation, and challenged all major gubernatorial candidates to endorse a clean water policy agenda.  The agenda, as reported in a past JCAA newspaper is strong and comprehensive.  It basically includes all the major elements of the Clean Water Act that have yet to be implemented such as strengthening the NJDEP’s authority to ratchet down industry’s permits to discharge pollution into the water and enforcement of other Clean Water Act mandates.  The agenda can be accomplished through regulations, so it has to have commitment of the current and future Governor to move ahead.

In April, the New Jersey Environmental Federation, a member of the Campaign, held two press events, one in Brick Township and one in Bergen County to highlight the elevated levels of a chemical in the local drinking water that has a suspected link to cancer and a known link to birth defects, miscarriages, liver and kidney problems.  Called trihalomethanes, these chemicals result from the formation of chlorine with matter in water that is too heavily polluted.Only one town, North Haledon in Bergen County, has levels that exceed the EPA’s maximum level or standard, but several other New Jersey towns will also be out of compliance with the standard when a new, lower standard goes into effect at the end of the year.

This month Mayor McGreevy, Democratic gubernatorial candidate, publicly endorsed the clean water agenda twice at two press conferences organized by his campaign staff. The first event was held April 18^th in Lambertville at the edge of the Delaware River and the second on April 22^nd was held outside the Trenton Water Filtration Plant. Republican candidate Bob Franks has not yet made his position on clean water policies known, and we encourage the members of the Jersey Coast Angler’s Association to urge him to support our clean water policy agenda.