Montclair Board of Education member, Tanya Coke, is petitioning against the proposed water well at Nishuane Park in Montclair.
Her petition, posted online at change.org, is addressed to the N.J. Department of Environmental Protection and Montclair Town Council members. Here’s an excerpt:
The township has not exhausted other feasible options for placement of the well, and must do so before taking away valuable parkland used by many members of the community. Montclair has a water surplus and has not made the case that the well is needed.
UPDATE:
Coke, who lives down the road from the proposed location for the well, described the area this way to Baristanet:
It’s one of the prettiest spots in all of Montclair, and THE community sledding hill for children in this area. In summers, our family picnics on the knoll at the top of the hill. We and other parents in the area instruct our children to ride their bikes through the glen on their way to town, in order to avoid traffic on Orange Road or Harrison Avenue.
According to all I have heard, Montclair has a water surplus, and most of the water produced would go to other towns. If future projections suggest we need more water, I would ask two things: what have we done as a town to conserve water? Second, what have we done to scout locations that are not on Green Acres-protected parkland?
I thought an electronic petition would help community members voice their opinions to the Department of Environmental Protection and to our Town Council members. Thus far we have 83 signatures and climbing.
It gets worse… I went to the Clerk’s Office and paid for a photocopy of the ‘report’. It turns out there were more than one document, the other was at the library. I still haven’t seen the other one.
I friend of mine who has seen both says there was no Green Acres Review on the 1982 drilling of the original well. The Green Acres application states that the Town “unintentionally triggered” a green acres review for 1.75 acres. In an email dated Dec. 5, 2012 (included in the Green Acres application) Green Acres says that, “As you know, we did not approve the location of the test well, and are now being asked to approve structures in a location within the park that could otherwise be used for future recreational development.” There was no application or mitigation for this well. Perhaps the Town stopped the process in 1982 because they knew the Green Acres application would be an “after the fact” application and result in denial and a fine.
Perhaps. But perhaps it was because the US was at the peak of the 1981-2 recession, our census numbers revealed Montclair lost 13% of our population, conversation was the conversation, and Montclair had just switched over to the Faulkner “council-manager” form of gov’t.
Still, I have to say, if Montclair drilled an illegitimate test well and if tonight’s council meeting is any indication, this is going to one hot kitchen.
Silly, silly me. Early 1980’s. Of course!
“Elements of Risk: The Politics of Radon”