Letter To Governor Corzine Regarding to the New Site for School 20

April 22, 2008

Governor Corzine

Office of the Governor
PO Box 001
Trenton, NJ 08625
609-292-6000

Dear Governor Corzine:

We are writing to ask you to resolve a dispute between two state entities that has delayed – and might derail – the construction of a desperately needed new school in the Greenville neighborhood of Jersey City.

Greenville is a predominantly African-American and Hispanic neighborhood, with thousands of low- and moderate-income working families who struggle to find safe, decent public schools for their children. They are fortunate to have one of the city’s more successful schools in the neighborhood, Public School 20. But the school is located in a small, aging building, with overcrowded classrooms supplemented by adjacent “temporary” trailers.

More than a decade ago, school officials and community leaders identified an ideal vacant site for a new facility for PS 20, at the corner of Ocean Avenue and Cator Avenue. The state’s Schools Development Authority acquired the site, and with the input of the PS 20 community, developed a first-rate plan for a modern facility. This proposed new school would be the first SDA construction project in the Greenville section. The vision for this school is embraced by school officials, parents, neighbors and adjacent property owners. This project would help revitalize and anchor a long-neglected area, and is a top priority of Jersey City school officials. By all measures, it would appear to be exactly the kind of project for which the state created the SDA.

There is one obstacle, however. The property contains high levels of toxic waste which the state Department of Environmental Protection has failed to get cleaned up, despite nearly two decades of agency attention. The waste is hexavalent chromium, one of the worst known carcinogens, and is present at more than 100 times safe levels. Fortunately, the state long ago identified the party responsible for the contamination as Honeywell International – a company with the ability to pay for the cleanup. And, under the terms of the cleanup agreement negotiated in 1993, Honeywell has a clear obligation to conduct the cleanup; DEP, under this agreement, has the clear authority to set deadlines, standards and methods for the cleanup. Indeed, under the 1993 agreement, the cleanup should have been completed more than a decade ago.

Instead, as has been the case in so many other similar sites, DEP has failed to carry out its mission of protecting public health and the environment, even where the most difficult part of the work – winning a hard-fought cleanup agreement – has been done.

We recently reviewed some of DEP’s files on this case, to try to find out the status of the cleanup and the reason for the long delays. What we found was surprising. We had read about the SDA’s previous failures to ensure that some contaminated sites in urban areas were permanently and adequately cleaned up prior to school construction, and we feared that SDA might have taken a similarly sloppy approach here. We also feared that SDA might have been too willing to use taxpayer dollars to pay for a cleanup that should be fully financed by Honeywell.

Instead, the files show that SDA is taking its mission seriously, at least at this site. For several years, SDA has been asking DEP to enforce the 1993 agreement with Honeywell and to require a timely and permanent cleanup of the site, so that construction can proceed. And, at least as indicated by the correspondence we reviewed, SDA is insisting that the polluter pay 100% of cleanup costs. We commend Mr. Scott Weiner, the Chief Executive Officer of SDA, and Mr. Thomas Ahern, who has been leading SDA’s efforts on this project.

The problem is that DEP has failed to insist, from the outset, that Honeywell conduct a permanent and fully protective cleanup. Until SDA objected, DEP appeared willing to let Honeywell consider an untested experimental cleanup method at this site, rather than excavation and removal of hexavalent chromium. (We agree with the SDA on this: while we strongly support experimentation to develop alternative cleanup remedies, a public elementary school is not the place to start.) Over strenuous objections from SDA, DEP has granted Honeywell one extension after another.

While SDA appears to have learned from its well-publicized failures, DEP seems intent on repeating its mistakes over and over again.

The result of DEP’s dysfunction has been that schoolchildren in the Greenville neighborhood remain overcrowded in PS 20, or forced to attend substandard schools elsewhere. A prime parcel in the heart of the neighborhood remains toxic, and the chromium waste there continues to leach into groundwater and to make its way to surfaces, where it jeopardizes the health of those who live and work nearby. Neighbors of the site have never been informed by the DEP or state Department of Health that the vacant site contains hexavalent chromium; many of them heard of this for the first time when members of the Interfaith Community Organization knocked on their doors.

We ask that you act on behalf of the children and families of Jersey City, and insist that DEP immediately order Honeywell to excavate and remove all chromium-contaminated soil from the new PS 20 property. The project should be completed within one year. (We point you to Honeywell’s 1993 cleanup of Metro Field in Jersey City as a model. This site was cleaned up in a matter of months, under state oversight and media scrutiny, in time for the opening day of Little League baseball. Certainly the prospect of breaking ground for a new public school should carry the same sense of urgency.)

Our organizations plan to gather, along with members of the PS 20 community, on May 21. We would appreciate a response by that time.

Sincerely,

Parents and Communities United for Education (PCUE)

Interfaith Community Organization (ICO)

PS 20 Parents’ Council