The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection fined the municipality of Princeton $35,000 for operating a dump without proper permits, public records show.
Employees at the River Road facility in the northeast corner of Princeton allegedly took bribes to allow private contractors to dump waste at the sewer department site located at 290-298 River Road, which is adjacent to the former town landfill and the Stony Brook Regional Sewerage Authority. State officials inspected the site in June after receiving complaints from residents who read Planet Princeton’s stories about the alleged dumping at the site. Planet Princeton had received tips from a whistleblower about the illegal dumping by contractors. At least one contractor was also using municipal employees and town equipment for private jobs. Four employees were fired as a result of the investigative series, and three people were charged with second-degree bribery.
According to public records obtained by Planet Princeton, a representative from the NJDEP had flagged issues at the River Road site back in the winter when she inspected the old landfill, but no one from the NJDEP followed up on her complaint.
State officials sent three billing notices to the municipality for the fines related to operating a dump without a permit. The municipality has not paid the bill yet, according to state records. The charge is listed as open, but also as suspended.
The Princeton Council is slated to hire a law firm Monday night to defend itself against solid waste enforcement actions by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection and to deal with other legal environmental issues related to the River Road site. The town is hiring Lyndhurst- based lawyer John Scagnelli of Scarinci & Hollenbeck for costs up to $50,000. The agreement is retroactive to Jan. 1.
Potential costs for the cleanup of the site have not been made public. The sewer department was closed down after the scandal.
From left, Joseph Dopico, COO; Kevin Haney, CEO and president; Richard Maser, founder and executive chairman; and Leonardo Ponzio, executive vice president and chief administrative officer. – MASER CONSULTING
Linda Lindner reports for NJBIZ March 9, 2020 11:45 am
By the first quarter of 2021, the business will be rebranded as Colliers Engineering Services. Maser’s senior leadership, which announced changes in January, will remain significant shareholders of the business under Colliers’ unique partnership model.
The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the second quarter of 2020.
Maser is one of the leading multi-discipline engineering design and consulting firms in the U.S. The company provides planning, consulting and design engineering services to multiple end markets including site civil, survey and geospatial, transportation, water and wastewater, telecommunication and geo-environmental. In 2019 Maser generated revenue of $167 million.
“Our investment in Maser is another step forward in our strategy of adding more highly valued, essential services to our private and public real estate and infrastructure clients,” said Jay Hennick, global chairman and chief executive officer of Colliers International.
“Our partnership with Colliers – the first in our industry – is the next evolution of our business,” said Richard Maser, Maser founder and chairman. “Colliers’ enterprising culture, decentralized management style, significant insider ownership and proven track record were important factors in choosing our strategic partner.”
In connection with this transaction, AEC Advisors acted as financial advisor and Sidley Austin acted as legal advisor to Colliers.
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By MEREDITH COHN, PAMELA WOOD and COLIN CAMPBELL THE BALTIMORE SUN – MAR 07, 2020 | 11:53 AM
The three people who tested positive for the novel coronavirus this week were on an Egyptian cruise on the Nile River, said Gov. Larry Hogan, who shared more details during a Friday evening news conference about the Montgomery County residents, the first confirmed cases in Maryland.
The three — a couple in their 70s and an unrelated woman in her 50s — are currently isolated in their homes and their symptoms are abating.
Five of their family members have been advised to be tested and officials continue to trace their contacts with others to determine if more people should also be tested, said Fran Phillips, deputy state health secretary for public health during the news conference.
One of the patients traveled to suburban Philadelphia and met with students and others there, which resulted in Pennsylvania health officials deciding to temporarily close five Bucks County schools.
Another of the patients attended a Feb. 28 event at The Village at Rockville, a retirement community. Health officials say 70 to 100 residents, visitors and staff at the event may be at risk for COVID-19. They are urging them to monitor for symptoms such as fever, cough or difficulty breathing until March 13. They should also take their temperature twice a day and notify their health care provider if it’s greater than 100.4 or they have other symptoms. Anyone who attended the Feb. 28 event is encouraged to contact their physician or the Maryland Emergency Management Agency call center at 410-517-3720.
“We’re obviously concerned, we’re not getting any sleep and the information is coming at us pretty fast and furious,” Hogan said during the conference.
Hogan announced the three positive tests Thursday evening and then declared a state of emergency, allowing Maryland to mobilize its emergency operations center and ramp up its coordination with local and federal agencies.
In addition to the three confirmed cases in the state, eight tests are still pending among the 44 tests conducted. One person under investigation is at University of Maryland St. Joseph Medical Center in Towson, the hospital confirmed Friday. It’s unknown where the others are located or if they are hospitalized or isolated at home as they await results.
The Assembly Telecommunications and Utilities Committee will meet on Thursday, March 19, 2020, at 10:00 AM in Committee Room 11, 4th Floor, State House Annex, Trenton, NJ.
The committee will take testimony from invited guests on an update to the New Jersey Energy Master Plan, entitled “2019 New Jersey Energy Master Plan: Pathway to 2050.”
(The public may address comments and questions to Kevin J. Donahue, Committee Aide, or make bill status and scheduling inquiries to Carla Novatkoski, secretary, at 609-847-3840, fax 609-292-0561, or e-mail: OLSAideATU@njleg.org. Written and electronic comments, questions and testimony submitted to the committee by the public, as well as recordings and transcripts, if any, of oral testimony, are government records and will be available to the public upon request.)
**Updated at 3 p.m. to include additional news stories**
But in a rare public dispute, Senate Democrats disagree over aspects of the bill
Sen. Paul Sarlo proposed to amend the food waste bill, arguing the legislation is not “practical.’’
Tom Johnson reports for NJ Spotlight
By a narrow vote, the Senate yesterday gave final legislative approval to a bill that would require large generators of food waste, such as hospitals, prisons, restaurants and supermarkets, to recycle their trash instead of sending it to landfills, or, in most cases, incinerators.
The bill (A-2371) was approved the same day as the Senate also passing, by 22-14, a much-debated measure (S-864) to prohibit single-use plastic bags and paper carry-out bags — like the food waste bill, long a top priority of environmental organizations in New Jersey. The plastics bill still needs to be approved by the Assembly, where its prospects are a bit murky.
Each of the issues has defied reaching a consensus among lawmakers. Both measures died in the lame-duck legislative session earlier this year despite gaining some traction in either the Assembly or Senate, only to falter because neither house could agree with the other’s version.
Nevertheless, the movement on both bills marked a victory for proponents given the opposition the proposals faced in previous sessions, not only from industry lobbyists but from lawmakers themselves.
That surfaced yesterday in the Senate in a rare public dispute among fellow Democrats over the food waste bill with Sen. Paul Sarlo (D-Bergen) proposing to amend the measure, arguing the legislation is not “practical.’’
Sarlo: It would increase costs
Sarlo contended the bill will increase costs to institutions and public entities by requiring them to send their trash, potentially over large distances, to be recycled in so-called food digesters, instead of landfills. Many landfills have built methane collection systems to capture gas from food waste in garbage dumps and convert it into electricity.
“This bill will destroy those systems,’’ Sarlo said in offering amendments to the bill to conform to what was agreed to in the prior legislative session. That bill, however, was conditionally vetoed by Gov. Phil Murphy, who faulted the idea of sending waste to garbage incinerators.
Under the current bill, facilities would be prohibited from sending food waste to a licensed incinerator or landfill only if they could demonstrate economic hardship.
Sen. Bob Smith (D-Middlesex), the sponsor of the bill, said that only 15% of food waste would end up in landfills, the third-largest source of methane emissions in the world. “We have to do everything we can to turn around climate change,’’ said Smith, adding methane is more than 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide, the most prevalent greenhouse gas emission causing climate change.
Concerns about location
Other Democratic senators, however, expressed concerns that these food digesters would be built in urban areas already overburdened with pollution facilities, otherwise known as environmental justice communities.
Senate President Steve Sweeney (D-Gloucester) sought to blunt those concerns by vowing to back a bill (S-232) now pending in the Senate that gives environmental justice communities more ability to fight unwanted projects that increase pollution in those communities. Ultimately, the bill only won approval by a 22-17 vote.
Food waste recycling bill heads to Murphy’s desk, again
Lawmakers on Thursday sent a bill to Gov. Phil Murphy’s desk that would ramp up recycling requirements for unused and wasted food.
The proposal, Assembly Bill 2371, took an unusual route through the state Legislature when it bypassed any committee hearings on the Senate side, drawing the ire of lawmakers at an afternoon voting session on March 5, who unsuccessfully attempted to stall the controversial measure.
Many critics pushed Thursday for an exemption to be reinserted into the bill that would allow the disposal of food in landfills or trash incinerators to count as recycling, such as Sen. Paul Sarlo, D-36th District, whose district in Bergen County includes landfills.
Murphy vetoed the measure over the summer because he worried those exemptions “severely weakened” it.
Sen. Paul Sarlo at the New Jersey Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee meeting on May 14, 2019. – AARON HOUSTON
“We find ourselves here today, not on the original bill, not the agreed-upon bill, not the handshake bill, not the bill that was comprised,” but a bill that “bypassed the environment committee, bypassed the budget committee, right to the floor,” Sarlo said.
The proposal would require large generators of food waste, such as hospitals, prisons, restaurants, and supermarkets, to recycle food garbage rather than send it to incinerators or landfills.
Many lawmakers, especially those representing urban districts where the foul odors and noxious fumes of incinerators and landfills find their way into local resident’s lungs, reluctantly approved the measure.
“My apprehension toward this bill is not the good environmental impact it will have … my apprehension … is that in areas like Newark, that have key geographic locations with the port and every interstate in the state of New Jersey, makes it such a viable and attractive place to become a hub for one of these facilities,” Sen. Teresa Ruiz, D-29th District said Thursday.
“We already have an incinerator and we already have the port. We already have enough truck traffic that is creating asthma numbers in pluralities like we’ve never seen before,” the Newark senator added. “Communities that are already negatively impacted within environmental issues are removed from this capacity so that when these sites are getting built, we’re not double-dipping in areas that just get clobbered on time and time again.”
Senate President Pro Tempore Maria Teresa Ruiz at the Senate Reorganization meeting in Trenton on Jan. 14, 2020.
At its core, the bill requires generators of more than 52 tons of food per year to separate food waste and send it to the closest authorized recycling facility within 25 miles.
Sen. Bob Smith, D-17th District, the bill’s main sponsor, argued that the legislation would create an entirely new industry, revolved around environmentally conscious food recycling, rather than letting it sit in a landfill where it would produce methane gas. In the years to follow, the booming industry would drive down costs and vastly outdo any expenses that businesses might incur in the near future, Smith argued.
The state Senate on Thursday passed and sent to Gov. Phil Murphy legislation that would require facilities such as supermarkets, restaurants and hospitals to separate and recycle their food waste. The bill also changes the definition of Class I renewable energy to include renewable natural gas, or biogas. The Senate passed the measure, 22-17, after considerable discussion. The Assembly passed it last month. “If we want to get some of our food waste out of landfills, this is the way to do it,” said Sen. Bob Smith, who sponsored the bill.
New Jersey Senate Passes Long-awaited Food Waste Bill
The bill, which ultimately passed as A2371, requires large food waste generators—hospitals, prisons, restaurants, grocery stores, etc.—to separate and recycle food waste. It also amends the definition of “Class I renewable energy.”
Specifically, under the bill, every large food waste generator that is located within 25 miles of an authorized food waste recycling facility and that generates an average projected volume of 52 or more tons per year of food waste within that radius would be required to source separate its food waste from other solid waste. They would then need to send that source-separated food waste to an authorized food waste recycling facility that has available capacity and will accept it. This only applies to an individual establishment or location that generates an average projected volume of 52 or more tons per year of food waste, so individual schools would not apply.
Finally, recycling facilities would be required to employ minority and women applicants that reside near the facility.
The legislation was sponsored by Senate Environment and Energy Chair Senator Bob Smith and Sen. Christopher Bateman.
“Food waste in this country and in New Jersey is a major problem and a serious waste of resources. The purpose of this legislation is to encourage the construction of more food waste-to-energy facilities, which can use food waste to generate electricity,” said Smith (D-Middlesex/Somerset) in a statement. “This process will ensure a constant source of separated food waste at our sanitation facilities across the state.”
The bill was released from the Senate by a vote of 22 to 17 and is on its way to Gov. Phil Murphy’s desk.
The New Jersey Composting Council touted the bill’s passage as a “legislative win,” explaining that the bill will do the following:
Create a Food Waste Recycling Market Development Council to provide recommendations on how to increase demand for products and energy generated by food waste recycling facilities.
Require state departments or agencies that engage in landscaping or construction to use compost, mulch or other soil amendments generated from recycling of organic materials where competitively priced and feasible.
Provide a financial incentive for energy generated at a food waste recycling facility by giving the facility a “class I renewable energy certificate,” which in turn can be sold on an open market or to energy suppliers and can be used by energy suppliers to meet renewable energy portfolio requirements.
New space in Parsippany to support growing staff with state-of-the-art tech, lounges, and amenities access
EWMA announced plans for its new corporate headquarters in Parsippany. After more than 20 years in the Lanidex Plaza, the environmental remediation company said its new facility will be ready for occupancy in the fall of 2020.
“This brand new facility, now under construction, will help improve productivity, which will allow us to better serve our clients, plus create even more job opportunities,” said Michael Sylvester, executive vice president of EWMA. “Our modernized design supports enhanced workforce collaboration and teamwork, on all levels and across all departments.”
For the past 20 years, EWMA has also been a proud partner of the Parsippany community.
“As the company begins its next chapter of expansion, we are looking forward to investing in the tremendously talented employees within the area. It is an exciting time for EWMA and our new facility will be a great place to work,” Sylvester said. “Our new space will allow our shared services and operating teams to better serve our employees, vendors, and customers, and will help facilitate our next wave of growth.”
“The goal of this new workspace is to support what employees want and need from a work environment, and for many of them, that’s tech to make their jobs simpler,” Sylvester added. “We took that to heart when selecting and designing a new headquarters.”
According to Don Richardson, president of EWMA, the company chose to stay in the Parsippany area to continue their support of the greater Morris County business community.
“We’ve made a 20-plus year commitment to Morris County’s economy, and to Parsippany in particular,” Richardson said, noting that EWMA is a longtime member of the Morris County Chamber of Commerce and regularly participates in fundraisers for local charities. “We are committed to the economic vitality of this area.”
There is a practical element, too: Richardson said that Parsippany’s access to major highways, excellent schools, and shopping make the community an ideal one for those looking to live, work, and play within their new chosen communities. Being so close to amenities and recreation opportunities alike makes it easy for employees to access what they need, when they need it.
“We liked Parsippany for a long time because of its ease of access to other parts of the state, but as we grew, we began to see how much our employees appreciated being so close to practical amenities,” adds Richardson. “The entire area continues to draw a diverse and talented workforce; it’s truly a gem of Morris County, and we are excited to continue growing our roots here for years to come.”
EWMA will move into its new headquarters by Fall 2020.
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