Action Center
Tuesday August 5, 2008
Despite Reservation, Boro OKs Salt Shed Contract
by Tom Boud
The Department of Public Works (DPW) is getting a state mandated salt shed at its headquarters. Local officials have something to say about footing the cost, given today’s tough financial times.
D. Gencarelli Building and Equipment of Nutley is constructing an impermeable salt shed under a $289,000 contract. The town is financing the deal through two bond ordinances. The facility’s planned footage dimensions are 40 feet wide by 48 feet deep by 29 feet high.
On July 31, borough officials held a pre-construction meeting with the contractor and work began thereafter. Borough Administrator Kevin Galland said the shed is expected to be completed before winter.
Councilman Keith Kazmark said he feels the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) shed mandate is illogical.
“You’re storing salt that you are laying on the roadway and it ultimately goes to the storm drain. It does not make any sense.”
Kazmark said the edict adds to the fiscal grief brought by Trenton
“They cut aid two points,” he said, about the recent $160,000 general state aid reduction, “and they turn around and tell us you have to build a salt shed. In the economic climate we’re living in, this is one of the things that’s hard to digest.”
Fred Bowers – a state DEP pollution control official – said the shed mandate is warranted for environmental protection. Typically, towns stack salt stockpiles on the ground, leaving them prone to water runoff, he said.
“When you have a pile of salt sitting in the same place year in and year out, it causes contamination problems.”
Bowers said runaway salt constitutes a contamination hazard to nearby water sources, such as residential wells.
“The salt seeps into the ground, and finds it way into the ground, and to the well.”
The DEP official said road laid salt is a lesser pollution factor than when heaped in DPW yards. He stated that spread salt is less concentrated, thereby posing a lesser ecological threat as it gets diluted over a very wide area.”
Kazmark said he is not totally swayed by Bowers’ position. The councilman said the present recession makes the salt shed’s expense more onerous.
“I hear where they’re coming from. If this was a different economy, I might be sympathetic to that argument.”
Kazmark added the allocated funds could have gone for other borough endeavors.
The councilman said state mandates should be state funded. He said without those dictates, there would have been no municipal tax increase this year.
Kazmark did say the DEP has given some latitude to the town. West Paterson was spared fines as the salt shed mandate adherence deadline had passed.
On an interesting note, Galland said West Paterson’s standard salt storage policy has been working well. The administrator said the material has been kept on a concrete slab with a secure covering. He added the DEP has not found fault with it.
“They never said our system is not working. What they said is we are not in compliance with the law that we have to have this in a fixed building. We’re in compliance with the intent,” he said.
Galland said, at any rate, it would be wasteful for the DPW to have an unprotected mound.
“At the cost of salt today, who wants to rain to wash it away? If it becomes sufficiently wet, you can’t use it, because it clumps together.”
Reprinted with permission. (c)2008 Passaic Valley Today (Passaic Co., NJ) Tom Boud
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