Herald & lantern 5 December '84 ■

News Digest (From Page 1)

on Jan. 26. District boundaries, those ligible to vote, and the polling place(s) have yet to be decided, according to commission Solicotor John L. Ludlam The commission held its last election in 1965. Used To Be Frogs OCEAN CITY — Police boarded a school bus and found a student carrying a half-foot long stick of dynamite in his coat pocket last week. The youth, 15, of Upper Township, was charged with possessing an explosive device. The bus was taking students home from Ocean City High School when police were alerted by the school through an anonymous tipster and halted the bus on Bay Avenue near 14th Street. Police later exploded the dynamite safely. 16 Indicted COURT HOUSE — County grand jurors have returned indictments against 16 people for theft by deception in alledgedly failing to report earned income to the county Welfare Board while collecting a total of $250,000 in welfare, food stamps or Medicaid benefits during the past eight years. All are free on Superior Court summons. No Thanks OCEAN CITY — Coast Guard officials . have turned down as too costly real estate salesman Frederick Prinz's proposal that it buy a $2 million bayfront estate near its Great Egg station for housing. The Coast Guard said it will proceed with plans to build by 1986 the $485,000 housing project along Bay Avenue on vacant land it owns near the station. Some 4,200 square-feet of housing will replace leased units for Guardsmen. 3 Yeirs; No Strikes COURT HOUSE - Locai 1358, United Food and Commercial Workers, AFL-

CIO, voted overwhelmingly in favor of a three-year, no-strike contract with Burdette Tomlim Memorial Hospital last week. Besides benefits, the contract i- also calls for 4 percent pay hikes in 1986 and 1987. Non-professional staffers 5. ratified the pact 6-1 and professionals 2-1 with about three-quarters of the membership voting Nov. 27. Group Home? _TUCKAH0E — Officials from the state Division of Mental Retardation and the Society for Retarded Children notified township committee last week that Upper i- Township is one of several municipalities being considered as the site of a group home for retarded citizens. State law on- * 'y requires the Department of Human Services to notify a community about site selection after a property has been purchaed. That wasn't the case in Upper but ♦ the committee decided to protest that policy in a letter to the society. • Back in the Saddle TRENTON — State Senate Republicans have reelected Sen. James R. Hurley (Cape May-Cumberland) to a second yearly term as assistant minority leader. Elected senator in 1982, the Millville politician was chosen minority whip then . and again the following year. Last year he was selected assistant minority leader for the first time. He begins his second term Jan. 8. Found Guilty (Again) WOODBINE — Borough resident Clarance Dixon, 47, is scheduled for sentencing Jan. 11 for sexually assaulting a mentally handicapped girl, 15, on March 4 here. Dixon's wife, Pauline, was indicted for conspiracy in the crime but was sentenced to two years' probation on a disorderly persons offense in May provided she received mental health counseling. Clarance Dixon pleaded guilty in July 1982 to sexually assaulting a girl, 14, in Woodbine. He was found guilty of the latest assault Friday.

Middle: But Who Pays? —

(From Page 1) property he reportedly rents from Gerald Davis. On a plea bargain, he was placed on probation and his fine suspended in return for his testimony in the case. He linked former Sea Isle City businessman Francis C. Block to the dumping. Block, head of a waste hauling outfit, consistently denied the allegation but also pleaded guilty, in January 1983, to a public nuisance charge. He also received a suspended sentence in exchange for his testimony. According to court documents, the county Health Department ordered Theodore Williams to remove the drums in January 1979. He allegedly gave Block permission to store them at the site. Williams told officials he tried unsuccessfully to contact Block, head of Atlantic Steel Drum Co., about hauling the drums away and then tried to dump them at Mar-Tee landfill. (The drums contained chemicals reportedly traced to a Wheaton Industries subsidiary — see related story). Denied permission to dump the drums at Mar-Tee, Williams "punctured said drums, allowing their contents to flow onto the land and percolate into the groundwater according to case reports. # THOSE CONTENTS included lead, mercury, benzene and chloroform. After a Sept. 17, 1979 survey of the tract, a state in- * spector filed this report. "Thirty-two drums were on site. An area, measuring 200- by 200-feet, had discolored soil and evidence of dumping various materials. A strong odor 9f detergents was detected ... One section of the property had a crusty type of material covering it; and all the trees in the area were dead." . In December 1982, the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) added the Williams' property to its list of the i 24 most hazardous waste sites in the state. I It ranks 241 on the EPA's list of the 418 I most toxic places in the nation. s

"Analysis of sludge and soil indicate that the waste, containing heavy metals, pesticides and organics. was deposited at the site, and many of the chemicals are carcinogenic (cancer-causing) and bioaccumulative or toxic," Ash wrote Callinan last week. "Although the county ... has arranged for the delivery of water to ... the occupants, the county has ascertained ... that the occupants might be drinking said contaminated well water, which could be severely injurious to their health, and the said occupants are using the water for bathing and washing clothes," the county solicitor continued. "... Theodore ... and Gwen Williams admitted that they and their family were using the said contaminated well water for bathing and washing clothes." Over objections from Middle Township officials, the county Planning Board decided last spring to prohibit building on properties under its jurisdiction within one mile of the Williams' property. Later, the county Health Department banned new wells in the same area. MIDDLE MAYOR MICHAEL Voll proposed in late May that the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP)spend federal Superfund money to install 'water mains for residents of the stricken area. New Jersey Water Co. estimated the installation cost at more than $840,000. Voll saw the proposed project in part as a way around the building ban. Freeholder Gerald Thornton, who oversees the county Health Department, conceded that water mains would have that effect but he regarded cleanup of the site as more important. A cleanup study was originally and only tentatively slated for late 1987 but the EPA handed the DEP $540,646 in September to begin one. It is supposed to be completed in six to 18 months.

- Reduced State Police Force Guards 15,000

WOODBINE — In addition to this ,t borough, there is no local police protection in the neighboring townships of Upper and Dennis. Some 15,000 people reside in that area of 90 square miles. ■T The void is filled by a contingent of state troopers who patrol the area from a base in Port Norris, but their numbers have recently dropped from 50 men to 40, County Sheriff-elect James Pious is said. Plousis was asked whether he saw a , need for providing county police protection in those areas. r "I don't have access to any budgetary . breakdowns in the sheriff's department for next year," Plousis said, but he added that a county police force could be established if the money is found to train and pay , enough officers.

"AND, OF COURSE, those areas would have to expect to underwrite some of the costs themselves," Plousis said "It is being done in Cumberland County They do have county police for such areas in Cumberland, and yes, it is possible," he said. "The State Police did have 50 men in Port Norris. They're down now to 40. but in my contacts with Lieutenant O'Brien over there, he has told me they are making a real effort- to cover the < Cape May County ) area," Plousis said. "I don't know what their response time is, but I have been told that they are responding as soon as calls come in" he said. "Now, it may take a little longer if the call is about a barking dog. but accidents and things of that nature take priority."

Woodbine Demands Town Watch —

(From Page l) ly hang outside Martin's Happy Tap saloon on Washington Avenue, Hudgins yelled : "I'm not gonna tell those boys to go home. They won't go, and I'm not gonna get beat up for it. We tried to form a town watch three years ago, Ernie, and you opposed it then." Materio, the mayor, yelled back:, "We didn't have a crowd three years'^ ago," referring to the cross-mix of white collar workers, laborers, store merchants, clergy, and parents present, which included whites, blacks and Hispanics. ANOTHER SPECTATOR shouted: "Your letter said the sheriff-elect would be here tonight. That's why so many people showed up." The mayor then threatened to shut down the town's three bars and one private club, as the crowd cheered and clapped. "We can notify all the bar owners to clean up their act, or we cari* put it on a referendum and close them all up," he said. All but a few favored that suggestion, although various members of the community, including a former assistant police chief who said he has worked as a bartender, later described all four establishments as being properly run. Materio said he couldn't understand why Woodbine needed a town watch. "WE HAVE a new chamber of commerce. We're going to have better lighting in the business district. We're getting a bad press because of the town. I don't know why." That prompted a woman to yell back. "Before you put lights up, you oughta clean up the streets. They're filthy. Ifp eople would clean up in front of their own house, we wouldn't have so much trash in the streets." One man who said he had been living in Woodbine only a year and a half added: "My place has been broken into four times. There are two roving gangs of boys up on Washington Avenue. The Happy Tap is bringing too many people. I'd like to see Property on Ballot — ( From Page 1 ) Pennsylvania. Mead was not sure what the additional $7,000 would cover, but suggested it might be for the election settlement costs, attorneys' fees, insurance, etc. Guest purchased the property about three years ago and listed it with Diller and Fisher for $147,000 until about a year ago. No Realtor is involved in this proposed transaction. Both Sellers and Hutchinson said the purchase was "not going to cost the taxpayers anything." What they meant was that it would not require a tax increase since the mone$ is available in the undisclosed surplus. STONE HARBOR Elementary has less than a hundred pupils in grades kindergarten (which includes Avalon pupils) through eight. It doubles up grades one and two, three and four, five and six, and seven and eight in single classrooms. Sella- said the school is "not overcrowded, but we can always use more room."

that Happy Tap. moved about five miles n somewhere else*" Hudgins. who said he once had organized 0 150 boys into playing Little League a baseball in the community, but gave it up n four years ago. said afterwards that. "I y just couldn't do it all by myself. I ruined my health trying, and nobody else seemed e to care except the kids. "THE ELEMENTAHY school's not open r for kids after school We had to fight for i, rights to play baseball on our own fields." I- Hudgins said, describing how grown adults teams from outside the town and would come in and rim Hudgins and the e youngsters off the fields, e Another man said he ha^ asked borough authorities why there is no supervised 1 recreation in the town and was told that the kids would throw glass on the basket ball courts, and that turning the outdoor j lights on at night would use electricity, i "That facility is not being used." he » said. "There is a basketball court, tennis courts, and a skating rink We should crack down on the kids hanging on the corners, but give them someplace to go It t won't break us." i Another man yelled. "We have more good kids than bad kids." And a woman complained loudly, "We're trucking our youngsters out of town (to Upper Township for (supervised) athletics." THE MAYOR interrupted to tell the ' crowd he didn't want to hear such negative things, but that was just the beginning of the complaints. "I've lived here 51 years," said another man, "and Woodbine has always had little problems, but we've never had the problems that we have here tonight. I served 25 years as assistant police chief, I worked on the board of health which we don't have anymore, and I've worked as a bartender "Now, we have the good people of Sea Isle and Stone Harbor and the MUA (Municipal Utilities Authority) sending their truckloads of trash to our dump in Woodbine," he added, "but there's no revenue coming (as a result) into the borough They're not going to give us any money to run our police department." The mayor again threatened to shut down all the town's bars, but this time, the — crowd murmured against it. "The loitering outside is confined to onlyone bar." a man yelled out "Why close them all down?" "IF THIS MANY people care, anything is possible." said Materio. adding that if the town council fails to get behind the peo pie, then the people very well could throw out the council. "That's your right," he said And then the mayor promised there would be more money in next year's town budget for recreation, although be didn't say how much, and he promised there would be volunteers to help Hudgins if he cared to get involved with youth programs again. Finally, a local merchant came up to Hudgins as the crowd adjourned for coffee break and said he'd be willing to provide refreshments for the kids if Hudgins wanted to start the programs again "That's fine, that's good," Hudgins replied. "We're gonna get you some volunteers to help, we've got the people, now." the mayor told him. "We've got people who are interested, now."