Slow crawl of Bucks, Montgomery tainted-water lawsuits

Dismissals, appeals and plenty of dense procedure define first 18 months of lawsuits filed over widespread drinking water contamination along the counties’ border.



Kyle Bagenstose reports for the Bucks County Courier Post:

Eighteen months after a slew of lawsuits were filed over drinking water contamination in Bucks and Montgomery counties, the cases still are in limbo in county and federal courts.


The suits represent more than a thousand area residents who were presumably exposed to unregulated perfluorinated chemicals in their drinking water, which are believed to have originated from firefighting foam used at military bases near the counties’ shared border. The suits seek myriad remedies, including blood testing, health screenings, and monetary damages related to health conditions, property values and other related costs.


“We’re still in the infancy,” said Donald Soutar, an associate attorney of New York City law firm Weitz & Luxenberg and lead counsel of the largest area lawsuit. “It’s fair to say (it’ll be) a matter of years.”


In total, eight significant lawsuits have been filed on behalf of residents affected by the contamination since 2016, although several have since been consolidated. Soutar, whose firm is associated with consumer advocate Erin Brockovich, is lead counsel on a consolidated class-action lawsuit, joined by attorneys from Creedon & Feliciani of Norristown, as well as attorneys from three Philadelphia-based firms: Anapol Weiss, Levin Sedran & Berman and Napoli Shkolnik.


More than a thousand residents have signed on to the suit, filed in September 2016, Soutar said. However, if successful, its class-action status means that any of the tens of thousands of residents meeting certain criteria for their exposure to the chemicals would be eligible for awards, including a medical monitoring program to screen for potential illnesses, a blood testing program and certain monetary damages.


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Dozens of shareholder climate resolutions target oil, gas

                                                                 Photo credit: David McNew/Getty Image

Concerned investors want details on climate risk planning, methane and lobbying, but some executives see Trump’s embrace of fossil fuels as reason to say no.


David Hasemyer writes for Inside Climate News:


When a group of investors asked Noble Energy, Inc., to report on the risks climate change poses to its business, the company’s response put on display how the Trump administration’s pro-fossil-fuel stance is swaying the perennial debate.


Similar resolutions brought by concerned shareholders have won increasing investor support since the 2015 Paris climate agreement, and grudging acceptance by some in the industry.


Not Noble. The Houston-based oil and gas company urged its shareholders to vote down the resolution, and then it described its vision of an unfettered regulatory future under the Trump administration.


“The current administration and the Republican Congress have adopted policies aimed at increasing the production of domestic oil and natural gas resources and repealed or amended certain executive orders and regulatory policies that have restricted or adversely impacted development,” the company wrote. “In sum, the proposal calls for a report that would be principally based on speculative assumptions about a legislative and regulatory environment that is inherently unpredictable.”

Nearly three dozen shareholder resolutions related to climate change risk have been filed this year with publicly traded oil and gas companies and electric utilities, to be voted on by their shareholders at annual meetings spread throughout the spring. Executives often urge shareholders to vote down such resolutions, and there are concerns this year that the administration’s positions could lead to even more complacency, by both companies and their investors.


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New Jersey Future forum addresses redevelopment

How to keep the best and brightest young people from fleeing New Jersey was just one of the topics at the New Jersey Future Forum. Panelists also addressed making redevelopment more attractive to town officials, how to offsset NIMBY opposition, the implications of climate change for coastal communities and the importance of infrastructure.


Leah Mishkin has the story for NJTV News.

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Richard Mroz leaving NJBPU, returning to private sector

Richard Mroz, former president of the NJBPU

Tom Johnson reports
for NJ Spotlight:


Richard Mroz, a commissioner and former president of the state Board of Public Utilities, is leaving the agency that oversees energy, water, telecommunications, and other regulated utilities next month.


His departure opens up a spot in the agency, which could be facing a significant shift in policies, especially governing the future of the state’s energy policies and a pronounced focus on clean-energy choices like solar and wind power, the latter mostly ignored in the Christie administration.


In a letter to the governor, Mroz said he would resign effective April 14. His letter said he would return to the private sector, but remain in the energy, utility, and infrastructure industries. In a phone interview, he declined to elaborate. Without Mroz, the agency’s board is split between two Republicans and two Democrats.


As president, Mroz was a strong advocate for the Christie administration’s policies, including unyielding support for expansion of natural gas pipelines in the state, as well as backing investments by gas and electric utilities to make their power grids more resilient to extreme storms, such as Hurricane Sandy.


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New Director for DRBC’s Science and Water Quality


Namsoo S. Suk, Ph.D.

West Trenton, N.J. –  Namsoo S. Suk, Ph.D. has been named as the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) Director of Science and Water Quality Management.  In his new position, Suk’s responsibilities include leading DRBC science and technical teams to: develop and apply hydrodynamic and water-quality models; conduct and coordinate monitoring and assessment activities; develop and update the Commission’s water-quality standards; and collaborate with the regulatory, stakeholder, and other scientific communities to meet the Commission’s clean and sustainable water goals.  


“Dr. Suk brings to his new position a wealth of extensive experience that will support the Commission’s water resource management and science programs,” said DRBC Executive Director Steve Tambini.  


Suk joined the DRBC in 1998 as a water resource engineer/modeler and has held various positions of increasing responsibility with the Commission.  He earned his Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N.J., where he completed his dissertation on “Suspended Solids Flux Between Salt Marsh and Adjacent Bay: A Methodology for Long-Term Continuous Measurements.”  


Additionally, he earned his M.S. in Civil Engineering from Rutgers and a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Yonsei University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.  Since he has been with the DRBC, Suk has worked with Commission staff and external experts on: numerous water resource models; pollution waste load allocations; implementation of DRBC’s Water Quality and Special Protection Waters regulations; and collaborative implementation of the basin states’ and federal water quality regulations.  With more than a dozen publications to his credit, Suk regularly delivers technical presentations to academic and professional organizations in the region. 


Suk is replacing Thomas J. Fikslin, Ph.D., who has worked with DRBC since 1989, initially on assignment from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and as a member of the Commission’s staff since April 1993.  Fikslin is retiring at the end of the month after 43 years of environmental contributions to the country and region through his work at the Commission and the U.S. EPA.

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The DRBC is a federal/interstate government agency responsible for managing the water resources of the Delaware River Basin without regard to political boundaries.  The five commission members are the governors of the basin states (Delaware, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania) and the commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ North Atlantic Division, who represents the federal government

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NRA lobbyist shot down Scrub Jay’s bid to be Florida Bird


By Frank Brill
EnviroPolitics Editor


We all know how powerful the National Rifle Association is in killing off any restrictions on gun sales. But shooting down the hopes of thousands of school kids to name a state bird? A bird so gentle that it eats from your hand? 


S.V. Date tells the story in HuffPost of how a bill to designate the native Scrub Jay as the state bird was stopped cold in the Florida Legislature in 1999 when the NRA’s state lobbyist declared that the Scrub Jay ate the eggs of other birds. “That’s robbery and murder,” she declared.


As for all that hand-feeding? ‘“Begging for food isn’t sweet, she added.”It’s lazy and it’s a welfare mentality.”


Good thing the bird is native to the state or ICE might be rounding them up today for deportation.

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