From the campaign of Pat Quattrocchi
Candidate for Union County Freeholder

September 30, 2005

County Freeholders Hire Engineering Firm to be Environmental Watchdog

In the fall of 2004, just prior to the last General Election, the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders announced the purchase of 17 acres of land on Snyder Avenue in Berkeley Heights. Newly sworn in Freeholder Bette Jean Kowalski explained the property had been the site of the Shaw Plastics company, as well as Barry Oil Service and Duffy Fuels and that the county had paid $8 million of the $13 million purchase price and had entered into a deal with the municipality of Berkley Heights who had anted up the other $5 million. The Freeholders had tapped into the Open Space Historic Preservation and Recreation Trust Fund as the property would be used for baseball fields with Berkeley Heights building a Senior Citizen Center on a portion of the land. This particular piece of property had been tied up for years in litigation as the developer/owner had intended to construct 259 residential units, some of it would have been low income Mount Laurel housing, which the township wasn’t exactly thrilled about. There has been no disagreement that the soil is badly contaminated and no matter what the land is used for it must be reclaimed first, surely before the kids take to the fields or the seniors roll in.

Freeholder Kowalski is quoted in the Westfield Leader at that time as saying that the existing owner would be cleaning up the property, this by the way was a part of the deal. Obviously the owner is willing to foot the bill for remediation just to get rid of the land as it isn’t fit for his original plan anyway, the clean up is expected to cost about $1Million. Well guess what? The freeholder board just voted "yes" on resolution #977-2005, which calls for the County Manager to enter into an agreement with PMK Group of Cranford for the purpose of oversight services pertaining to the remediation of the Snyder Avenue property in Berkeley Heights in an amount not to exceed $202,222.25 from the Open Space Trust Fund. The contract was awarded without competitive bidding and the PMK Group has contributed $75,500 to the UC Democratic Committee between '00 and '04 as well a cool grand or more to the campaigns of Assemblymen Joe Cryan, Neil Cohen and Jerry Green in '05 and a token $300 to Linda Stender; she should complain.

There are two things wrong with this picture, if the deal called for the seller to fund the remediation why are the taxpayers picking up such a large tab. And second, a full time engineer could be hired in the neighborhood of $80,000 to $95,000 a year and a trailer on site to house this person for another $10,000, what on earth is the other $100,000 for? Why not have the property owner agree to hire the firm of the county’s choice to do the job right in the first place instead of the taxpayers providing the funding for a "watchdog". It looks as though PMK will recoup most of their political contributions here in Union County.

Nothing can be done about this situation now. Let’s just hope that the job is done right and as the County Manager explained to me that we do indeed avoid another Miesel Field mess which dragged on for years.

The Team of Quattrocchi, Kline and Dill for Union County Freeholder want to put an end to no bid contracts as they are certainly are a fleecing of the taxpayers. To learn more about the issues please visit our website unioncountygop.org or call us at 908-789-0200.