Privatizing land-use permit reviews: Good idea or bad?

New Jersey’s Department of Environmental Protection has a plan to use private contractors to review land-use permit requests. It’s drawing heat from environmentalists who say its sneaky way to get around civil service requirements and it undermines independent environmental protections.

Perhaps an overlooked question is: Will it make DEP’s more responsive and wouldn’t this benefit the state’s economy and the public? 

We wonder what you think. Let us know in the comment box below.
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Our most recent posts:
Federal funds stimulate two Superfund cleanups in NJ

NJ bills reward homegrown solar & wind manufacturing
NJ’s LSRP licensing board is nearing full strength 

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Federal funds stimulate two Superfund cleanups in NJ

FUSRAP Maywood Superfund Site in Bergen County, NJ.
Photo credit: Shaw Environmental & Infrastructure Group.

Federal stimulus funds help keep two  Superfund cleanups on track in New Jersey and  provide jobs for local residents.

Last year, Donald Applegate, a Middlesex County resident, was unemployed and heard that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was using American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds or stimulus money to hire local people to work on hazardous waste site clean-up projects throughout New Jersey.

“It couldn’t have come at a better time,” said Applegate, who was hired to be a health and safety specialist with Sevenson Environmental Services, a contractor hired by the Army Corps to work on the Cornell-Dubilier Electronics Superfund Site in South Plainfield.

Around the same time, Marie Casciano, a Passaic County resident was also seeking employment because her employer was forced to reduce her work schedule to part time work. Like Applegate, she found a position working on an Army Corps project.

“This position would not have become available had it not been for the stimulus money,” said Casciano, who was hired to be a project business administrator with Shaw Environmental & Infrastructure Group, a contractor hired by the Army Corps to work on the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP) Maywood Superfund Project in Bergen County.  

Read the full story, written by Dr. JoAnne Castagna,a technical writer-editor for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New York District.  It was published in NJTODAY.

Our most recent posts:
Environmental bills up for votes in the NJ Senate
Remember when we were the do-ers? The innovators? 

NJ bills reward homegrown solar & wind manufacturing
NJ’s LSRP licensing board is nearing full strength 
Bills in the NJ Senate Environment Committee – Sep 23

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Environmental bills up for votes in the NJ Senate

Members of the New Jersey Senate are scheduled to consider 43 pieces of legislation at their voting session tomorrow, Thursday, September 30, in Trenton.

Among them are four environmental bills:

S-59  Cardinale, G. (R-39); Weinberg, L. (D-37)
Creates bi state commission to coordinate management and flood prevention of waterways flowing between Bergen County, NJ and Rockland County, NY.
Related Bill: A-2440
    
S-463  Smith, B. (D-17); Buono, B. (D-18)
Authorizes creation of local renewable energy collaboratives and central renewable energy generation systems, and provides for sale of renewable power generation.
Related Bill: A-915
   
S-793  Madden, F.H. (D-4)
Encourages purchase of NJ solar panels and wind turbines for State projects and State-funded projects.
Related Bill: A-1555
  
S-2231  Sweeney, S.M. (D-3); Kean, T.H. (R-21)
Allows tax credits for development of qualified wind energy facilities in port district of Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
     
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including committee and floor amendments. 
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Our most recent posts:
Remember when we were the do-ers? The innovators? 

NJ bills reward homegrown solar & wind manufacturing
NJ’s LSRP licensing board is nearing full strength 
Bills in the NJ Senate Environment Committee – Sep 23
Rutgers’ Fall Seminars for Environmental Professionals

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Remember when we were the do-ers? The innovators?

Thomas L. Friedman
From Their Moon and Ours by New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman:

“China is doing moon shots. Yes, that’s plural. When I say “moon shots” I mean big, multibillion-dollar, 25-year-horizon, game-changing investments. China has at least four going now: one is building a network of ultramodern airports; another is building a web of high-speed trains connecting major cities; a third is in bioscience, where the Beijing Genomics Institute this year ordered 128 DNA sequencers — from America — giving China the largest number in the world in one institute to launch its own stem cell/genetic engineering industry; and, finally, Beijing just announced that it was providing $15 billion in seed money for the country’s leading auto and battery companies to create an electric car industry, starting in 20 pilot cities. China Inc. just named its dream team of 16-state-owned enterprises to move China off oil and into the next industrial growth engine: electric cars. Not to worry. America today also has its own multibillion-dollar, 25-year-horizon, game-changing moon shot: fixing Afghanistan.”

And from Grist’s Jonathan Hiskes on the Friedman essay in Friedman misses what’s really holding America back on clean energy: 

It’s a solid piece, with one exception:

Europe is using $7-a-gallon gasoline to stimulate the market for electric cars; China is using $5-a-gallon and naming electric cars as one of the industrial pillars for its five-year growth plan. And America? President Obama has directed stimulus money at electric cars, but he is unwilling to do the one thing that would create the sustained consumer pull required to grow an electric car industry here: raise taxes on gasoline.

Let’s put blame where it belongs. Obama isn’t trying to raise the gasoline tax because conservatives have made it next to impossible to talk about raising taxes of any sort. Even phasing out tax breaks for millionaires might prove beyond the ability of Congress this fall — forget taking on something as pocketbook-sensitive as gas taxes.

Consider how absurd our current political situation is: We can’t even talk about half the equation of doing government. Politicians can appear at ribbon-cutting ceremonies for spending projects; they can promise spending “cuts” without specifying what they’d cut; but it’s suicidal for them to remind voters that it takes money to build rail lines or airports or a world-class education system. No wonder China and Europe are outpacing us.

Our most recent posts:
NJ bills reward homegrown solar & wind manufacturing
NJ’s LSRP licensing board is nearing full strength 
Bills in the NJ Senate Environment Committee – Sep 23
Rutgers’ Fall Seminars for Environmental Professionals

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NJ bills reward homegrown solar & wind manufacturing

Identical bills in both houses of the New Jersey Legislature would provide a significant business boost to in-state companies that produce (or might be wooed to the state to produce) solar panels or wind turbines.

The bills would require that government contracts for solar and wind projects be awarded to the lowest responsible bidder whose principal place of business is in New Jersey or who uses a majority of parts manufactured or assembled as a final product in the Garden State.

S-793 (Madden/Beach) and A-1555 (Lampitt/DeAngelo/Greenstein) would apply to projects “to be paid with or out of State funds, or in whole or in part with a grant or loan provided by the State to a governmental entity.”

The Senate legislation is in position for a floor vote in that house. The Assembly bill awaits consideration by the State Government Committee.

Have an opinion on the legislation?  Sound off in the comment box below.  If one doesn’t appear, click on the tiny ‘comments’ line below.

Our most recent posts:
NJ’s LSRP licensing board is nearing full strength 
Bills in the NJ Senate Environment Committee – Sep 23
Rutgers’ Fall Seminars for Environmental Professionals

_______________________________________________________________________

NOTE:  Subscribers to our daily newsletter, EnviroPolitics, get to monitor
the progress of all environmental and energy bills in New Jersey and Pennsylvania
–from introduction to enactment.  We supply links to all updated versions of bills,
including committee and floor amendments. 
Try EnviroPolitics without charge or obligation for 30 full days!
 ______________________________________________________________________

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NJ’s LSRP licensing board is nearing full strength

** Correction: We erred in our original listing of Michael Pisauro as representing the New Jersey Environmental Federation. Mr. Pisauro represents the New Jersey Environmental Lobby**

The New Jersey Senate’s Judiciary Committee tomorrow (9/23) is expected to approve the nominations of five of the remaining six persons named by Governor Chris Christie to the New Jersey Site Remediation Professional Licensing Board. The full Senate will need to confirm the committee action but that vote generally is virtually automatic. 

If approved by the committee and the Senate, the makeup of the board will look like this:

Site Remediation Professional Licensing Board  – 13 members

DEP Commissioner or designee  (1)

State Geologist  (1)

Business (1)
Richard T. Dewling, PhD    Dewling Associates, Inc.    3-year term
Academic (1)
James Mack   NJIT York Center for Environmental Engineering & Science   4 years

Environmental Organizations (3)
Joann L. Held                      Alliance of New Jersey Environmental Educators   3 years
Michael L. Pisauro, Jr.,        New Jersey Environmental Lobby                  2 years
**Benjamin Alter  (LSRP)     GZA GeoEnvironmental, Inc. – GreenFaith             1 year    
** (Nomination pending)

Site Remediation Professionals (6)
Christopher J. Motta     ARCADIS                                                            1 year
Ira Whitman                 Whitman Companies                                            4 years
Lawra Dodge                Excel Environmental Resources, Inc.                     3 years
Jorge Berkowitz            Langan Engineering and Environmental Services     2 years
Philip I. Brilliant             Brilliant Lewis Environmental Services                   2 years
Constantine Tsentas      ATC Associates, Inc.                                          1 year

Our most recent posts:
Bills in the NJ Senate Environment Committee – Sep 23
Rutgers’ Fall Seminars for Environmental Professionals

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