Published in the Asbury Park Press
By JEAN MIKLE
TOMS RIVER BUREAU
DOVER TOWNSHIP -- Responding to an appeal from a citizen activist, the state Senate president and three Ocean County lawmakers will introduce a bill today to provide $2.25 million in state funds to install carbon filtration systems on three more United Water Toms River wells.
Last week, Gov. Whitman signed a bill that provided $1.5 million in state funds to pay for filters installed in May on United's wells 22 and 29. The legislation to be introduced today by Sen. Andrew R. Ciesla, R-Ocean, and Senate President Donald T. DiFrancesco, R-Union, and Assemblymen James W. Holzapfel and David W. Wolfe, both R-Ocean, calls for similar work on wells 24, 44 and 15.
The money would come from the state's Corporate Business Tax Fund, the same source tapped last time.
Well 24 is located in United's parkway well field, where there have been contamination problems in the past. Well 44 is located in the parkway south well field, off Indian Head Road, while Well 15 is located off Brookside Drive.
United Water General Manager Edward A. Hughmanic said there have been no contamination problems with any of the wells. Hughmanic said the two parkway wells are not near Wells 26 and 28, which capture and treat a plume of ground water contamination from the Reich Farm Superfund site, located one mile north of the well field.
But the legislators said in a prepared statement that adding the carbon filtration systems will help reassure Dover Township residents that they are drinking water free of chemical contaminants.
Holzapfel said: "$2.25 million is a small price to pay if it means our residents will rest easier that they are drinking water free of chemicals."
Ralph Hahn, a spokesman for Ciesla, Wolfe and Holzapfel, said the three wells were chosen after consultation with Linda L. Gillick, who chairs the Citizens Action Committee on Childhood Cancer Cluster.
"When there was a chance that legislation could be possible, we asked Linda which two or three wells need these filtration systems in (her) opinion," Hahn said.
Gillick and other members of the citizens committee have long sought filtration systems on shallow wells in the parkway field that draw water from the Cohansey aquifer.
In the fall, Gov. Whitman ordered carbon filters placed on wells 22 and 29 after traces of trichloroethylene, a suspected carcinogen, were found in Well 29 last summer. Levels of about 0.4 to 0.8 parts per billion were found. The state considers water with up to 1 part per billion acceptable for drinking purposes.
Also found in the well were trace amounts of styrene acrylonitrile trimer, a chemical compound related to plastics production. A study is under way to determine if it the trimer is a human carcinogen.
Carbon filters remove the trimer and also trichloroethylene from water, although they are not effective at removing all volatile organic contaminants.
Hughmanic said Well 24, which is 125 feet deep, and Well 44, which is 130 feet deep, both draw water from the Cohansey, but Well 15, which is about 300 feet deep, draws from the Shark River aquifer.
"Because it's in the Shark River aquifer we are curious as to why it would need additional treatment," Hughmanic said.
Gillick is on vacation this week and could not be reached for comment, but citizens committee member Kim Pascarella welcomed the legislators' announcement.
Pascarella said he was surprised to see Well 15 included as a candidate for filtration.
Hahn said if there is a consensus that filters should be placed on another well, and not Well 15, the legislation can be amended.
Source: Asbury Park Press
Published: June 24, 1999
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