DEP lawsuits bring cleanups to polluted sites in Palmyra, Camden

TRENTON – Two long-polluted sites in South Jersey are expected to be remediated due to lawsuits brought by the state Department of Environmental Protection.

Companies that settled separate suits over blighted properties in Palmyra and Camden also agreed to pay about $810,000 in fines and penalties, state officials said.

Another firm that used the Palmyra site, Jersey Recycling Corp. and its owner Bradley Sirkin, face a default judgment for about $3.5 million for their role in unauthorized dumping at a former municipal landfill and for damaging wetlands, the Attorney General’s Office said in a statement.

The landfill is off southbound Route 73 near the Tacony-Palmyra Bridge and along Pennsauken Creek and Palmyra Cove on the banks of the Delaware River.

Suits target pollution in Camden, Palmyra

Under a second settlement, British Petroleum is to pay at least $360,000 to the DEP and Camden’s city government due to pollution at Monk’s Amoco. It also has agreed to clean up soil and groundwater contamination from leaking tanks that held gasoline beneath Monk’s Amoco at Broadway and Pine Street in Camden.

The Attorney General’s Office also said a lawsuit against a Hammonton business has led to better drinking water for migrant workers.

And it noted a suit was recently filed against a Millville business, Zeb’s Auto Service and Detailing. That suit contends Zeb’s has failed to comply with a 2022 order to address pollution concerns.

It asks a judge to enforce the order against Zeb's and to impose financial penalties.

The lawsuits targeted polluted sites in “overburdened communities,” described as towns where many residents have low incomes and a low proficiency in English.

The communities typically include many people of color and are places already facing “environmental stressors,” according to the Attorney General’s statement.

The Palmyra suit is expected to protect 31 acres of land along Pennsauken Creek.

It said the site is to be cleaned by Fillit Corp., a recycling firm that owned the property from1999 through 2021, and leased it to Jersey Recycling from 2012 to 2014.

The current owner, St. Louis-based Sansone Urban Renewal Entity II, (SURE) is expected to join with Fillit in the remediation process.

They also are expected to "properly" close the landfill.

SURE is not a defendant in the suit, the settlement notes.

Settlements call for fines, civil penalties

The Fillit defendants agreed to pay a civil penalty of $450,000, plus $12,000 in an outstanding penalty from 2011.

Under the Camden settlement, BP is to reimburse DEP $260,000 for the cost of previous clean-up work.

When the property is sold, it is to pay up to $100,000 to Camden’s government and the balance to DEP, “ensuring that New Jersey taxpayers do not bear the cost of cleaning up harmful contamination,” the statement said.

Both suits were filed in 2018. The BP settlement was reached in September, and the Palmyra case was resolved in August 2022, the Attorney General's Office said in its Sept. 28 statement.

The statement also noted a judge’s court order, brought in response to a state lawsuit last year, that directed the shutdown of unsafe wells at Blueberry Bill farm in Hammonton.

The order also required the farm to drill new wells in March of this year, prior to the growing season, to provide safe drinking water to its workers and their families.

The statement also noted a Sept. 7 court order that ordered 24 defendants to leave the solid-waste business until they have required permits and licenses, and to pay more than $8 million in penalties.

The Newark-based scheme falsely advertised “free clean fill” but in fact dumped contaminated solid waste on the unsuspecting owners of homes and farms, according to the suit.

Dumping sites included properties at unspecified sites in the Southampton and Woolwich areas, it said.

The defendants also were ordered to return the dumping locations to their original condition, the Attorney General’s statement said.

Jim Walsh is a senior reporter with the Courier-Post, Burlington County Times and The Daily Journal. Reach him at jwalsh@cpsj.com.

This article originally appeared on Cherry Hill Courier-Post: DEP lawsuits to bring improvements to Palmyra, Camden properties