Saturday, August 5, 2006
By CAROLYN SALAZAR and ALEX NUSSBAUM
STAFF WRITERS
Climbing the steps of Mahwah Township Hall four months ago, Governor Corzine was met with heckles and sneers from members of the Ramapough Mountain Indian tribe.
That was just weeks after a police shooting had exposed years of pent-up tension between the Ramapoughs and local leaders. Some shouted down Corzine when he tried to speak.
But, on Friday, as the governor entered a Ramapough community center in Mahwah, he was welcomed with handshakes, hugs, even kisses. Over and over, tribe members called him a "brilliant leader."
Corzine took two steps that tribe leaders praised during a tour of their communities in North Jersey on Friday: In Mahwah, he signed an executive order creating a commission to study the health and welfare of Native Americans in the state. Later, he toured the long-troubled toxic waste cleanup site in Upper Ringwood and pledged legal and medical support for residents who blame widespread illness on the pollution.
"The sense has been that we've turned our back on this group for far too long," Corzine said at the signing. "But now we are standing together, we are working together, and we are all taking proactive steps to address some of the wrongs that have occurred."
The moves showed the governor cared about a community that's long felt ostracized among its largely white, better-off suburban neighbors, Ramapoughs said.
"This is not a public relations stunt," said tribal Chief Anthony Van Dunk. "This is a governor who believes in us, and believes what he's doing."
The executive order created a six-member New Jersey Committee on Native American Community Affairs. The panel will explore civil rights, education, housing and health care needs of the Ramapoughs. Ken Zimmerman, executive director of the Newark-based Institute for Social Justice, will lead the high-powered group, which includes a former attorney general and the current secretary of state.
The committee will gather testimony from Ramapoughs and other community groups, and is expected to issue a report six months after its first meeting. With its help, Van Dunk said, he hopes the tribe will have a day-care center, a government outreach building and improved health care services in five years. Tribe members say there are 3,000 Ramapoughs living in New Jersey and New York.
Talks between the tribe and the governor began after a fatal confrontation in the Mahwah woods involving the Ramapoughs and New Jersey State Park Police. During the April 1 scuffle, Police Officer Chad Walder shot tribe member Emil Mann twice. Mann died from his injuries nine days later.
The criminal case has not been presented to a grand jury. There have been no charges related to the shooting.
The shooting exacerbated already fragile relations between tribe members and law enforcement.
"Mann's death was a precipitous situation -- a situation can't go any further than that," Van Dunk said after Friday's ceremony. "But what it showed was that there needed to be a change. The situation needed to be dealt with."
In Upper Ringwood, Corzine spent 90 minutes at the federal Superfund site where workers have removed thousands of tons of toxic paint sludge and other debris dumped amid the homes of another Ramapough community.
The governor, trailed by dozens of reporters and local residents and viewed two football-field-sized pits where contaminated soil was removed. He also visited the back yard of Roger DeGroat, where a 15-foot-deep sinkhole opened a year ago. Neighbors blame the hole -- and pits that have opened up nearby -- on the Superfund cleanup.
Corzine came with a $240,000 state grant for Ringwood officials to study and fill the holes; more money will be provided if need be, the state promised.
He also said the state should file a legal brief in support of neighbors' personal-injury lawsuit against Ford Motor Co. The automaker's Mahwah assembly plant, open from 1955 to 1980, produced the sludge that now litters the area.
Corzine said the state would also look into granting neighbors' requests for expanded health studies to see whether the pollution is behind reports of high cancer rates and other ills, though he made no promises.
"This is not the last time we'll be here," he told the crowd. "I think the state of New Jersey understands that we have a responsibility to make sure that we are advocates, to make sure that we get a redressing of the wrongs, the problems."
Residents said they didn't remember a governor visiting their neighborhood before. The tour sent the right signal, they added.
"I think it's wonderful he would take time to come up here," DeGroat said. "He's a busy man, and he showed a lot of heart, a lot of concern for my family, for this whole community."
Committee's agenda
Issues the New Jersey Committee on Native American Community Affairs is expected to tackle:
• Civil rights
• Education
• Fair housing
• Infrastructure
• Employment
• Health care
Bats won't hold up cleanup
Upper Ringwood's toxic waste cleanup is no longer in a bind over bats.
Tree clearing in the contaminated woods had been suspended over concerns that the endangered Indiana bat, a federally protected species, might make its home in the forest.
A wildlife survey over the last two weeks turned up four bat species but no Indianas, Erich Zimmerman, the lead engineer for cleanup contractor Arcadis, said Friday. With that assurance, the federal regulators overseeing the cleanup gave the go-ahead to resume cutting trees to clear the way for removing polluted soil.
"It's great news," said Wayne Mann, head of the Upper Ringwood Neighborhood Association.
"That was one of our worries, that the cleanup would be delayed."
The cleanup made progress on another front Friday. Following Governor Corzine's visit to the site, 22 residents gave the state permission to remove toxic paint sludge from their properties, ending months of negotiations. Lawyers for the neighbors said 16 more residents would soon give their OK as well, according to the state.
E-mail: salazar@northjersey.com and nussbaum@northjersey.com
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