For Immediate Release
February 3, 2010 Contact Jeff Tittel, 609-558-9100
Barnegat Bay Bill Conditionally Vetoed Statement by Jeff Tittel, Director NJ Sierra Club
Today the Governor used his pen to add more pollution into Barnegat Bay by conditionally vetoing the TMDL (Total Maximum Daily Load) bill. This conditional veto allows for more pollution to impact Barnegat Bay. The Governor has taken the side of polluters and special interests over cleaning up the bay. TMDL is a mechanism for cleaning up the bay by identifying and limiting the amount of pollution entering and requiring polluters to clean up pollution. Christie removed the timeline to implement the TMDL standard adding more pollution. The Governor has removed the bill's provision for studies of the Bay to be conducted by the DEP within a year. Now the DEP can study the bay to death without taking any actions to protect it. The bay takes another step towards dying with the Governor's action today. The Governor's Barnegat Bay plan is weak and undermines the real protections the bay needs. Barnegat Bay is a gem of the Jersey Shore and the Governor has put it in jeopardy.
Barnegat Bay continues to be threatened by overdevelopment and non point pollution. The DEP needs to come forward with a comprehensive plan to protect and save the Bay. This plan should include storm water management, cooling towers at Oyster Creek, stopping sprawl and overdevelopment, limits to impervious cover and pulling sewers out of environmentally sensitive areas and TMDLs. Barnegat Bay is the Jersey Shore's most heavily used body of water. On a summer weekend 100,000 people can be boating on the bay at different times. The Bay is a critical part of New Jersey's $4 billion tourism industry and there is worth a $100 billion in ratables in and around the Bay. If we allow the bay to die, we lose that portion of the economy. What's important to save the bay is to get beyond local and parochial interest. The current system is broken. If we don't change things the bay will die. This legislation is even more important now, given the Christie Administration's attacks on the environment - weakening storm water protections, holding up water quality planning rules, allowing sewers to be put into environmentally sensitive areas - are all affecting Barnegat Bay. The Governor needs to step up for the Bay and present a plan that will provide the real protections the Bay needs.
Kate Millsaps, Program Assistant NJ Sierra Club 145 W. Hanover Street Trenton, NJ 08618 609.656.7612 (f) 609.656.7618 <http://www.newjersey.sierraclub.org/> www.newjersey.sierraclub.org
Received on 2011-02-03 14:17:49