Published in the Asbury Park Press
By PATRICIA A. MILLER
TOMS RIVER BUREAU
TOMS RIVER -- Lawyers representing Dover Township families whose children have cancer are upset with the state's reluctance to provide the location of three private wells that were found to contain traces of dye products like those once manufactured at the former Ciba-Geigy Corp.
"I don't see why this information has to be secret," said Mark R. Cuker, one of the attorneys representing about 60 families.
The families formed a group named TEACH -- Toxic Environments Affect Children's Health -- in 1997 and hired Cuker and Boston lawyer Jan Schlichtmann to represent their interests during the state and federal investigations into higher rates of some childhood cancers here.
"The more information we have, the better we can understand the past," Schlichtmann said yesterday.
His eight-year battle to prove several companies polluted wells in Woburn, Mass., and caused a leukemia cluster was chronicled in the best seller, "A Civil Action."
The state Department of Health and Senior Services sampled 54 private wells in Dover Township between February and May 1997, and released the results to all the homeowners in December 1997, said department spokesman Thomas Breslin.
Breslin referred questions about the dyestuffs to the state attorney general's office.
The department's report cites the sampling results but the department has not provided the location of the wells.
The attorney general's office is in the process of determining whether the location of the wells is public information, said Chuck Davis, a spokesman for the attorney general office.
"We had questions about whether or not it was public information, whether or not we could release that information to the attorney," Davis said yesterday. "It was a right-to-know matter."
But Bruce W. Anderson, a TEACH member, said, "Everything should be out in the open. I would just hope they would be more up front and truthful and get the data out to us as soon as possible. If you don't ask the right questions, you don't get the information."
None of the families represented by Schlichtmann and Cuker had their wells tested as part of the study. But three of the wells sampled showed the presence of dyestuff compounds similar to what Ciba -- now Ciba Specialty Chemicals Corp. -- formerly used in manufacturing, Cuker said.
"They (state health department) are having public meetings where the EPA goes around saying no contamination has spread from Ciba, but yet we see these substances in private wells that matches up with what was used at Ciba-Geigy," he said.
Cuker first began asking for the information last October. He wrote six letters, including one to state Attorney General Peter G. Verniero. He said he received no reply.
"The Department of Health's refusal to provide general information about these sampling sites is astonishing, given the intense public interest in determining the source of cancer in Toms River," Cuker wrote to Verniero in an April 28 letter.
The letter also said the people who own the private wells were apparently told the water is safe to drink.
The TEACH families, Ciba-Geigy, United Water Toms River and Union Carbide signed an 18-month agreement in January 1998. The families agreed not to file suit during that time and the companies agreed not to use the statute of limitations as a defense if they ever did, Cuker said.
"The problem is with the Department of Health," Cuker said. "We haven't had any serious problems with the other parties, yet."
Schlichtmann yesterday the agreement would probably be extended beyond July 31, the date it expires.
"This has been a very helpful process," he said. "I think that all the parties realize that it's going to be helpful in the near future."
Source: Asbury Park Press
Published: May 20, 1999
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