By Ron Leir
LYNDHURST –
The township has placed off-limits – at least for now – its two Little League fields and Tball field, all in Riverside Park, after deeming them at risk to kids.
Mayor Richard DiLascio and Commissioner Tom DiMaggio, overseer of public parks and recreation, said the township had no choice but to suspend play on those fields, based on preliminary findings of toxins in the soil.
“We’re not going to open up (those fields),” DiMaggio said, unless and until the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) gives the township an all-clear.
“I’m not an expert,” DiMaggio said, adding that the township has been guided by the counsel of professionals to take the appropriate actions to safeguard the children who normally play on those fields.
DiLascio said that the fields are in a low-lying area on the banks of the Passaic River, which has been found to contain contaminants from industrial sources further up the river and spill from last fall’s Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee washed over the area, prompting a series of tests.
The testing, conducted by the township’s consulting environmental engineers, Remington Vernick & Arango, of Secaucus, “came back with elevated readings of BaP (benzopyrene).”
According to a fact sheet put out by the EPA, BaP “is a polycyclic hydrocarbon that is a by-product of incomplete combustion or burning of organic (carbon-containing) items, e.g., cigarettes, gasoline and wood.” It is “commonly found … in cigarette smoke, in grilled and broiled foods, and as a by-product of many industrial processes.”
The EPA says that BaP is chemically modified in the body of humans and animals “to form a number of metabolites that may elicit toxicity” and, which “can interfere with or alter DNA replication … and may be associated with an increased risk of several forms of cancer” for children.
“Children,” the EPA notes, “may also have greater exposure than adults to contaminated soil in areas where BaP-contaminated soil from industrial contamination may be present, because of behavior patterns, particularly hand-tomouth activity.”
DiLascio said that tests taken about a month ago have been sent to EPA and the township is awaiting the federal agency’s review of the data.
In the meantime, the mayor said, the township is directing its engineers to “do another set of tests” on soil samples extracted from a depth of six inches at the fields.
“Our other concern,” the mayor said, “is relieving any future overflows from the river.” The township is reviewing various strategies, including placement of a berm – barrier wall – to keep out the excess water.
For his part, DiMaggio is trying to keep cool about finding and scheduling alternate playing sites for T-ball and Little League games for the rapidly approaching season, which opens the second week of April.
Ever optimistic, DiMaggio added: “I’m not going to panic until we get clear information on the situation.” If the Riverside Park fields remain off limits, though, “it’s going to cause a little bit of a traffic jam,” he acknowledged. We can use Jefferson School for T-ball, possibly, but Little League’s going to be hurting the most.”
Lyndhurst Little League President Bob Laverty is also trying to stay calm amid a growing sense of uncertainty about playing space availability.
But the pressure is on, given that the opener for the league’s 16-game season is the Monday after Easter, with the traditional Opening Day Parade slated for April 14, and that, as of now, “we have no home (field),” Laverty says. Sadly, the township only recently installed new bleachers at the Riverside Park fields.
Matera Field off Page Ave. is an option, Laverty said, but the league will be competing for playing time with teams from Felician College and Queen of Peace High School. Another possibility, he said, is using the township’s Recreation Field complex on Valley Brook Ave. About 350 boys and girls are signed up to play Little League this year and T-ball registered about 125 children, according to Laverty.
“The most frustrating part for T-ball is that the township added two additional teams for this season,” he said. Whether those kids will be accommodated remains to be seen.
The township could end up backloading the schedule, DiLascio suggested.
Meanwhile, environmental activists like former Lyndhurst resident Ella Fillippone, executive director of the Passaic River Coalition, continue to push for the EPA to follow through on promises made to remove factory-produced contaminants from the river bottom.
“There are hot spots all along the shore in places like Kearny and North Arlington,” Fillippone said. “And the tide is spreading (the contaminants) every day; eventually, it will reach Newark Bay. … And when we get a storm like Hurricane Irene last year, it churns the stuff all along the river. The whole thing should be dredged and cleaned out. … It’s hard to know what’s taking the EPA so long.”
Asked whether Kearny had any reservations about the teens who crew along the river, Mayor Alberto Santos said he’s received no alerts from the EPA, or the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) or any other government agency advising against boating on the Passaic.
As The Observer’s production deadline neared, the EPA – at the paper’s request – released a March update on Lyndhurst recreational fields sampling results which appeared to indicate no justification for any remediation at the site.
An EPA statement said that while “relatively high concentrations of contaminants, including dioxins/furans, PCBs and mercury were detected (during 2011) in the tidal mud flats adjacent to Riverside County Park in Lyndhurst,” the agency followed up with further tests of surface soil from the park on Jan. 30 and 31, 2012, to determine whether public use areas in the park “were potentially impacted by sediment that migrated from the Passaic River during recent flooding events and (mixed with the soils).”
The EPA review “assessed the cancer risks and noncancer hazards associated with potential exposure to dioxins, PCBs and mercury” and concluded “that the measured concentrations of dioxins, PCBs and mercury are present in soil but are well below levels of concern.”
Therefore, the agency said, “EPA does not plan on further sampling of the recreational areas in the park and deems that park soil cleanup actions are not warranted in this instance.”
The EPA statement contains no mention of the BaP contaminant tracked by Lyndhurst’s consulting engineers.
