Gov. Christie Gave Lockheed Martin A $100 Million Subsidy, Despite Huge Toxic Pollution

Off Site Contaminant Plume May Impact Nearby Homes and Day Care Center

Why would Lockheed not answer a question about whether they provided public notification to all parties about the vapor intrusion risk?

Lockheed Martin (Moorestown, NJ)

The Star Ledger has a long overdue and superb editorial today raising concerns about Gov. Christie’s corporate subsides, see:

• N.J. tax incentives have exploded beyond control

This caught my eye:

Lockheed Martin, a defense contractor with multi-billion dollar profits, is one of the most recent benefactors. The firm got more than $100 million in state tax breaks to move just 250 jobs from its headquarters in Moorestown down the road to Camden. This was thanks to a last-minute provision slipped into the law that favored South Jersey, and Camden in particular.

To be sure, it’s a city in desperate need of development. But Camden is also inextricably tied to the political ambitions of South Jersey powerbroker George Norcross, which raises eyebrows.

But it’s not just Lockheed’ multi-billion dollar profits and George Norcross that should raise eyebrows.

The Lockheed Martin Moorestown site has massive groundwater contamination.

The plume of groundwater contamination has migrated off site and may be impacting nearby homes and business, including a day care center.

According to Lockheed Martin’s most recent Report to DEP, the groundwater is polluted with volatile organic toxic chemicals, including benzene, toluene, vinyl chloride, TCE, PCE, and others above DEP groundwater quality standards (GWQS) set to protect human health.

TCE levels were detected as high as 98,000 ppb in one monitoring well – that is 98,000 TIMES IN EXCESS of the DEP’s 1 ppb GWQS.

Curiously, the prior Lockheed Martin Report to DEP provided far more detailed information.

The prior Lockheed Report to DEP – known as a “Bi-ennial certification” –  revealed that the groundwater plume had expanded, migrated off site, and may have impacted homes and a day care center.

Expansion and off-site migration of the plume were inconsistent with the conditions established by DEP’s prior “Classification Exception Area” (CEA) and were evidence of serious problems at the site. Under DEP’s CEA regulations, the plume is required to shrink over time (not expand), be contained on site (not migrate off site) and the concentrations of pollutants are supposed to decline, eventually to meet GWQS.

The prior Report included maps of the expanded plume, the expanded CEA, and the vapor intrusion impacted homes and day care center.

Curiously, that Report has been taken down – hit this link to confirm that:

http://www.lockheedmartin.com/content/dam/lockheed/data/corporate/documents/remediation/moorestown-remedial-action-protectiveness-biennial-cert-form.pdf

The current report to DEP vaguely describes the toxic groundwater pollution and off site vapor intrusion problems in nearby homes and day care center like this:

The current Report does not include maps, and merely lists the owners and addresses of impacted off site homes and day care center at the very end of a lengthy document – an apparent attempt to hide that critical information.

The current Report leaves this DEP question unanswered:

Why would Lockheed not answer a question about whether they provided public notification to all parties about the vapor intrusion risk?

How could DEP approve the Report with that glaring omission?

Why would the Christie Administration give a $100 million subsidy to a corporation that is poisoning its neighbors and a day care center?

Why has there been virtually no press coverage of the Lockheed Martin pollution and risks to nearby homes and day care center?