Former state Assemblyman Louis Manzo spoke out at the April 23 City Council meeting about the city’s recent legal settlement with Morristown-based Honeywell International Inc.
As part of the settlement, Honeywell will give the city some land from its property near Route 440, while the city will have to clean up the chromium contamination there. Honeywell also will give the city $13 million to relocate city-owned buildings off of the property so the city can use it for residential development.
Manzo blasted the settlement during a public speaking portion on an ordinance that would convey land within the 100-acre area from Honeywell to the city for a park. After Manzo spoke, the city approved the ordinance.
But Manzo’s stern warnings came a bit too late – the actual settlement already had been approved in January.
Manzo, who worked in the city’s Department of Health in the 1980s, has dealt with the issue of chromium contamination for over 20 years.What the city could have done differently
At the council meeting, Manzo spoke of his concerns about the settlement, calling it a “bailout” for Honeywell International.
He said the city could have won hundreds of millions of dollars if they pursued their initial legal action.
“It saves Honeywell literally hundreds of millions of dollars in exposure and in damages if you look at what they had to pay in the other case,” Manzo said. The “other case” he referred to was the years of litigation by the Interfaith Community Organization (ICO), a community group that formed in 1986 to address the issue of building affordable housing in Jersey City. That case led to a ruling in federal court in 2005 calling for a thorough excavation and cleanup of the site directly south of the 100-acre settlement area, also owned by Honeywell International.
Manzo also said the city’s settlement would allow Honeywell to install a cap on the 20-acre open space to stop the seepage of chromium from the tainted soil, rather than excavating it.
City Corporation Counsel Bill Matsikoudis defended the settlement, saying there would be excavation for the portion of the site for residential purposes. But he admitted “some capping” for the open space.
He also said the case brought by the ICO did not cause millions of dollars in litigation.
Matsikoudis said that the city’s settlement did not get Honeywell “off the hook” as Manzo indicated.
“We have entered into an agreement that will benefit the city by having development done there, cleaning up of the toxic chemical waste, and we will see substantial revenues,” Matsikoudis said. SIDEBAR The settlement and future development
The City Council in January approved the settlement with Honeywell International Inc. that could begin the cleanup and development of 100 acres on the city’s west side.
A good portion of the land had been contaminated by cancer-causing hexavalent chromium. Forty-one acres of the land is owned by the city, and the rest is owned by Honeywell.
Once the final details are worked out and the land is cleaned, officials expect that there will be a drastic change of the city’s west side in the next 15 to 20 years.
The settlement is the result of lawsuits pursued in 2005 by the Jersey City Incinerator Authority and Jersey City Municipal Authority in federal court against Honeywell Inc. Honeywell’s corporate predecessor, Mutual Chemical Co., allegedly dumped tons of chromium on land across from Mutual’s plant on Route 440, which now includes the locations of the Jersey City Incinerator Authority, Jersey City Municipal Utilities Authority, and the Jersey City Department of Public Works.
Also settled is litigation against Honeywell by the Hackensack Riverkeeper, the environmental group that, since 1997, has worked to clean up the Hackensack River, which runs though the western part of Jersey City. The river is polluted by the chromium that ended up seeping into the water.
The city has also approved a redevelopment plan for that area.
Officials say they hope to see 8,000 units of housing, along with more than 1 million square feet of commercial and retail development, and 20 acres of open space.
The city predicts it may get as much as $160 million in revenues from property sales and $45 million in annual property taxes from the deal.
The settlement also describes a plan that would relocate the Jersey City Incinerator Authority and Department of Public Works to land at the PJP landfill site located a mile away from the proposed cleanup land. The Municipal Utilities Authority, also located on the tainted land, would remain at the site but would be rebuilt to take up less space. – RK Comments on this story can be sent to rkaulessar@hudsonreporter.com