For months, those pushing for a wet weather pump for northwest Hoboken have jumped through hoop after bureaucratic hoop. The pump, along with a water-retaining park in the southwest part of town, are cornerstones of Mayor Dawn Zimmer’s “expeditious” strategy to address chronic flooding caused by heavy rain.
For at least a week and possibly more, though, the pump has been put on hold. This past Wednesday, a resolution authorizing the city to issue $11.9 million in bond notes for the pump’s construction fell one vote shy of the six affirmative votes on the nine-member City Council necessary to move forward.
Back in December, the council had unanimously approved a bond ordinance funding the H5 Wet Weather Pump Station, but on Wednesday, Councilwomen Beth Mason and Theresa Castellano balked at the prospect of issuing bond notes.
Both cited lingering concerns about the pump location picked by the city, in the ground beneath Eleventh Street, among residents of Maxwell Place, a condo complex that directly abuts the site.
The combined sewer pipes that drain the flood-prone northwest area around ShopRite pass beneath Eleventh Street on their way to an outfall into the Hudson River, but some Maxwell residents argue the pump could be placed somewhere else nearby or foregone altogether.
The five council members allied with Zimmer voted in favor, and Councilmen Tim Occhipinti and Michael Russo were absent.
The flood pump will primarily be funded through an $11.9 million low-interest loan from the New Jersey Environmental Infrastructure Trust (NJEIT). The bond notes considered Wednesday required a two-thirds majority for approval because they will be sold directly to the NJEIT and the state as part of the loan process.
In light of the two absent council members, Mayor Zimmer called a special City Council meeting to reconsider the bond resolution on Monday, Feb. 23 at 7 p.m. In a press release, city spokesman Juan Melli said the special meeting would “allow all members of the council to vote on the H-5 wet weather pump station.”
“It’s not about the bonding, it’s about the residents not being happy.” – Theresa Castellano
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Had Councilman Russo been in attendance this past Wednesday, the special meeting might not have been necessary. In the past year, Russo, despite being a past political opponent of the Zimmer administration, has provided the sixth vote on a number of bond ordinances pushed by Zimmer, including a $5 million bond for parking meters last October.
Public process
The decision of Councilwomen Mason and Castellano to oppose the bond sale drew condemnation from some of their council colleagues.
“Even if the resolution passes eventually, I hope residents do not forget that Mason and Castellano took a stand against providing a sensible flooding solution funded through a low interest loan,” said Council President Ravinder Bhalla in a statement released Thursday. “I don’t understand how these council members could in good conscience vote against a flooding solution that would improve the lives of so many residents.”
In the same press release, Councilman Peter Cunningham noted that both councilwomen had voted for the original flood pump bond ordinance in December.
“However, on Wednesday night when it was time to fund the project,” said Cunningham, “they’ve proven that they can only provide lip service to residents when it comes to flooding solutions.”
Mason and Castellano defended their votes after the meeting, saying they thought the concerns of residents living near the proposed site of the pump on Eleventh Street had been given short shrift.
Castellano said she has heard an outcry from residents questioning the placement of the pump and the safety of its future construction since the bond ordinance was approved in December.
“It’s not about the bonding; it’s about the residents not being happy,” she said. “This is councilperson 101.”
Mason reported a similar experience. “At first, [the flood pump] sounded good,” she said in an interview, “until after the December vote I got so many calls from residents up in this area of town…they were very upset because they didn’t even know it was going on.”
Mayor Zimmer and the North Hudson Sewerage Authority (NHSA), which will operate the pump, presented their proposed plans at a meeting of the Maxwell Place Board of Trustees last November, but Castellano said there should have been a full process with open public meetings and stakeholder advisory committees, as the city has undertaken for other large projects.
Concerned citizen speaks out
Halting the flood pump process suited Geoffrey Schulman fine. The Maxwell Place resident has serious concerns about the placement of the flood pump, which he expressed before the council on Tuesday.
Schulman attended the Maxwell Place board meeting on the pump in November, and said he was disappointed by the lack of public input.
“They weren’t there to discuss anything with us,” said Schulman, “they were there to sell us the plan…They looked us right in the eye and said ‘there is no other solution. This is the only place.’”
Upon researching further, Schulman found a 2013 report prepared for the NHSA by engineering contractor EmNet that detailed a range of possible solutions for mitigating flooding in northwest Hoboken, some of which did not require a new pump station at all.
The H5 pump was originally slated to be placed in Maxwell Place Park, but the city and the NHSA decided to relocate it to Eleventh Street because building in the park would have required the creation of a new sewer outfall, as well as additional approvals from the state Green Acres program.
A particular concern of Schulman’s was alleged toxic contamination in the construction site left over from the days of the Maxwell House coffee plant.
“There are two preschools adjacent to the site,” he said, “and they’re more or less going to rip Eleventh Street open for a block from sidewalk to sidewalk.”
In a November letter to the Maxwell Place Board, Zimmer said the pump station construction site had been remediated prior to the build-out of Maxwell Place, and that any vapor intrusion by contaminants had been mitigated. She also promised to require air testing during the pump’s construction.
Still, Schulman’s fundamental qualm was with the speed of the process and the lack of transparency by the city.
“It just seems like it fits a timeline that fits the mayor’s goals,” he said. “Everyone’s for alleviating the flooding problems in Hoboken, but I think we need to take a step back, look at all the options, let there be a public debate as to the correct one.”
Diversity of opinion
That characterization didn’t sit well with some council members. “The fact that the report provided other alternatives doesn’t mean that they weren’t considered,” said Councilman James Doyle. “A decision was made, whether you like it or not.”
Doyle also said the presence of toxic contaminants shouldn’t necessary preclude construction.
“There are 2,000 toxic waste sites across the country that are opened up safely every day,” said Doyle, who currently works as a lawyer with the Environmental Protection Agency. “There has to be a way that you can safely open up the ground where there’s contaminated soil, if there is in fact contaminated soil…it’s not as if this land cannot be touched for the rest of time.”
Bhalla emphasized that Schulman did not speak for all Maxwell Place residents.
“What I sense from speaking to the residents of Maxwell Place is that there is a diversity of opinion,” Bhalla said.
Bhalla suggested that Mason and Castellano had voted against the bond resolution based on Schulman’s testimony alone. “I think it’s remarkable when certain council members pander to one member of the public when making a decision and don’t consider thousands of people who are potentially going to be adversely impacted by this decision,” he said.
Mason strongly rejected the implication, telling Bhalla, “I’m very disappointed to hear you say that somebody who doesn’t agree with your opinion is pandering to one member of the public.” She advised Bhalla to “limit his personal opinions and stay to the facts.”
Danger of default
A separate resolution permitting the sale of $7.9 million in bonds for the city and $3.9 million in bonds for the Hoboken Parking Utility garnered the same 5-2 vote margin Wednesday. The resolution funded past infrastructure projects by the city and other matters.
Believing a two-thirds majority necessary to pass the resolution, Wiest warned that delaying the sale amounted to “playing with default” on some of the city’s debt. However, after consulting with the city bond counsel, Wiest clarified Thursday that a simple majority had been sufficient to pass the resolution.
After the meeting, both Mason and Castellano said the Zimmer administration should have advised the council in advance of the ramifications of not approving its proposed bond ordinances.
While Wiest did not explicitly spell out the possibility of a default before the vote, he did say that the $7.9 million city bond sale arose from “older bond ordinances…that have been rolled several times and they’ve reached their limit in terms of their ability to be rolled.”
Mason explained in an interview that she does not support bonds due to concerns about the obligations created by municipal borrowing. She said the city bonded a lot to cover its Hurricane Sandy recovery costs and that she wants to make sure the money is paid off.
Castellano also typically opposes bonds, calling them a way to hide large amounts of spending.
However, the $7.9 million in city bond notes being issued by the resolution arose from two ordinances passed in 2002 and 2006, prior to Zimmer’s tenure. The ordinances funded improvements to city buildings, removal of underground storage tanks, and purchases of city vehicles, among other things. Mason was not on the City Council at the time, but Castellano voted for both of them.
Wednesday’s bond resolution also covered $3.4 million in Parking Utility bonds, which will be used to pay off outstanding debt arising from previous rounds of Parking Utility bonding in the 1990s. Castellano voted against the original ordinance authorizing the bonds, also in 2002.
Carlo Davis may be reached at cdavis@hudsonreporter.com.