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DEP No Longer Prepares Mandated Public Reports On DEP Enforcement & Permit Performance

Intolerable Lawless Bureaucratic Arrogance And impunity

When DEP denies the OPRA’s and is forced to admit that these Reports don’t exist, maybe the NJ press corps and environmental groups will get off their lazy incompetent assess and do something about it. ~~~ Critical Information Buried In The Bowels Of The Bureaucracy

Although the current Commissioner of DEP is a [former corporate] lawyer, the DEP seems to believe that they no longer are required to comply with environmental laws that were designed to provide important information to the public and hold DEP accountable: the Clean Water Enforcement Act (CWEA) and the Environmental Management Accountability Plan Act (EMAP).

Those laws are still on the books. They require  DEP to prepare and submit annual public Reports to the Governor and Legislature.

But the DEP no longer does so.

And the excuses they provide to explain why they don’t are factually false and outrageous examples of intolerable lawless bureaucratic arrogance.

I) Clean Water Enforcement Act

Back in the late 1980’s, NJ environmental groups, led by NJ PIRG, documented that DEP systematically failed to enforce violations of water pollution control permits.

Corporate polluters and sewage treatment plants were getting off the hook and water quality declined as DEP failed to do their job and inspect polluting facilities, monitor discharge data, and enforce permit requirements designed to protect water quality.

The environmental groups mounted a Statewide clean water campaign and were able to secure passage of the Clean Water Enforcement Act (CWEA). Governor Florio, a national environmental leader, signed the bill into law.

The CWEA was a national model and the strongest clean water law in the country. It eliminated DEP’s “enforcement discretion” and mandated penalties for violations of water pollution permits. It mandated annual DEP compliance inspection.

The CWEA was enacted to hold polluters and DEP accountable.

To do so, it also mandated that DEP submit an annual public Report to the Governor and the Legislature.

That annual Report provided important statewide information on how DEP was enforcing clean water laws. It named polluters and provided the public with information on many things, including identifying “significant non-compliers”, the enforcement fines DEP imposed, the nature of the violation, the name and location of the polluter and the polluters’ stream or river, etc. – including criminal actions, criminal investigations and emergency response incidents.

Over time, these Reports were able to document trends in compliance and DEP enforcement.

Every year, NJ PIRG would hold a Trenton press conference and use the CWEA annual Report as a “report card” on the performance of polluters and the DEP. Those press conferences generated press coverage across the state and the public was informed and able to hold DEP and the polluters accountable.

The pressure created by the disclosure of information by the CWEA annual Report, environmental group monitoring, and media coverage served to better protect water quality.

The polluters and DEP always hated the CWEA and tried several times to convince the legislature to gut the law. They failed and the CWEA remains in place.

Here’s how DEP describes the Clean Water Enforcement Act (emphases mine):

In 1990, the Legislature enacted substantial amendments to the Water Pollution Control Act (WPCA), commonly known as the Clean Water Enforcement Act, P.L. 1990, c. 28 (CWEA). The CWEA requires the department to inspect permitted facilities and municipal treatment works at least annually. Additional inspections are required when the permittee is identified as a significant noncomplier. The CWEA also requires the assessment of mandatory minimum penalties for violations of the WPCA that are considered serious violations and for violations by permittees designated as significant noncompliers.

The CWEA requires the department to submit a report on the implementation of the CWEA’s requirements to the Governor and the Legislature by March 31 of each year. The statute also specifies the items that the department must include in the report. The department has organized the required information into several categories, including Permitting, Enforcement, Delegated Local Agencies, Criminal Actions, Fiscal, and Water Quality Assessment.

The DEP website notes that the most recent CWEA Report was filed over a decade ago, in 2010.

I strongly urge readers to hit the links and read those CWEA Reports to see the critically important information they provide. Start with the 2010 Annual Report.

Then consider whether you could readily reproduce anything remotely like the information provided by these Reports via the DEP’s “data miner” (aside from all the time and effort you would have to invest in doing so, instead of well paid bureaucrats at DEP doing the work they are paid and legally required to do).

So  I recently submitted a Open Public Records Act (OPRA) request for the annual DEP CWEA Reports for the period 2011 – 2020.

DEP denied that request, and provided the following reason why they no longer comply with a legislative mandate:

Since 2011, the NJDEP no longer produces the traditional Annual Reports due to the labor-intensive and budgetary constraints  involved in generating such a comprehensive report. The NJDEP has been attempting to comply with Section 9 of P.L. 1990, c.28 (NJSA 58:10A-14.1 – 14.3) by making information available on its website. The bulk of the information that is available can be found through the NJDEP’s DataMiner application (https://www13.state.nj.us/DataMiner), the water quality website (https://www.nj.gov/dep/dwq/), and the enforcement website (https://www.nj.gov/dep/enforcement/). If there is some specific information from the traditional reports that you are seeking to obtain, please email the Office and the NJDEP can further assist.

Let’s break down DEP’s excuses:

1. Labor intensive – aside from the legal absurdity of such a claim, that is a factually false claim, because the DEP staff levels that historically were able to prepare Annual CWEA Reports remain. And those DEP staff are doing other discretionary work as opposed to the legislatively mandated CWEA report work. Management 101.

2. budgetary constraints – another legally absurd and factually false claim. The DEP budget is similar if not larger than the budget DEP found adequate historically to rep-rare these reports. Regardless, DEP staff are doing discretionary work and legislative mandates come first.

3. Attempting to comply? -come on! That’s a lame “dog ate my homework” excuse and it is transparently false.

The Christie DEP stopped preparing these reports and they did so for policy reasons (i.e. “regulatory relief”) in downsizing and dismantling DEP’s regulatory role and protecting polluters, not the public interest.

4. website information – dataminer – making limited information available on a website  – which does not come close to providing access to the legislatively mandated information provided in prior CWEA Reports – does not comply with law and it shifts the burden from DEP to the individual citizen.

It is not the citizen’s responsibility to do this work – it is DEP’s legislatively mandated job. Most citizens lack the expertise required to even ask the technically correct questions.

Regardless, an individual data miner query can not provide the information provided in prior CWEA Reports.

It is astonishing that the environmental group (currently renamed from NJ PIRG to Environment NJ) is not fighting for the Reports that they were able to mandate via their work in getting the CWEA passed.

Shame on Doug O’Malley, who spends his time kissing Gov. Murphy’s ass instead of holding DEP accountable and fighting for clean water.

It is also astonishing that the Legislature and media give DEP a pass on this as well.

II) Environmental Management Accountability Plan 

The EMAP law, also known as the “Doria” “Permit Activity Report” law – named after sponsor and former Assembly Speaker Joe Doria – was enacted during the Florio administration in the early 1990’s largely in response to the business community’s attacks on DEP permit processing delays.

The law requires detailed reporting of all permit, enforcement (e.g. scroll down to see annual air enforcement reports, which haven’t been issued in a decade), and related activities at DEP. (see DEP website)

Here’s an example, from the 2002 DEP Doria Report:

Here is DEP’s webpage (scroll down).

The DEP’s excuse for not submitting these Reports is even worse than the CWEA excuse:

In December of 2008, the NJDEP suspended the production of the “Doria Reports”.The NJDEP has since provided on its website associated  with the Doria Reports (2002 – 2007) the following notice: “In light of significant advancements in the Departments ability to track and report permit activity on-line it has been determined that there is no benefit to continuing to publish the Permit Activity Report.” However, the Department has developed web-based reports to provide permit review information. This information may be accessed via the Department’s Data Miner application.  The Department provides a “Permit Dashboard” under “Searched Published Documents”; as well as other Dashboards in DataMiner that provide permit activity information.

Let’s drill down again:

1. No benefit? To whom? Obviously, the DEP staffers don’t want to be held accountable and corporate polluters don’t want the public to know that DEP rubber stamps approval of over 95% of permit applications.

And the public is denied information on the volume and type of Statewide permits, trends in types of permits, et al (e.g. it is important to know how many wetlands or coastal permits have been approved by DEP, the rate of approval, the timeframes for review, and the locations of where these permits are being issued).

Wouldn’t it be good to know how many air pollution (greenhouse gas emissions) and warehouse permits were approved and/or pending before DEP?

2. . “It has been determined”  – Note the passive voice. Determined by whom? On what basis?

DEP has no legal authority to “suspend” a legislative mandate.

If DEP feels that the Doria Reports are no longer providing any “benefit”, then they should go to the legislature and make that argument and request that the law be repealed.

A website “Notice” doesn’t cut it. It is incredible that DEP even attempts to make this kind of claim.

Finally, individual queries can not substitute for comprehensive Statewide data and provide trends. The DataMiner does not provide the equivalent information provided in prior Doria Reports and the reliance on Dataminer shifts the burden from DEP staff to the citizen.

It is astonishing that the business community, who were responsible for passage of the Doria law to hold DEP accountable, have given DEP a pass on this.

I will write Senate Environment Committee Chairman Bob Smith to demand legislative oversight of this flagrant lawless abuse.

Strumming my pain with his fingers,
Singing my life with his words,
Killing me softly with his song,
Killing me softly with his song,
Telling my whole life with his words,
Killing me softly with his song. ~~~Roberta Flack version (1973)

I was driving across the burning desert
When I spotted six jet planes
Leaving six white vapor trails across the bleak terrain
Like the hexagram of the heavens
Like the strings of my guitar
Amelia, it was just a false alarm.

The drone of flying engines
Is a song so wild and blue
It scrambles time and seasons if it gets through to you
Then your life becomes a travelogue
Full of picture post card charms
Amelia, it was just a false alarm

People will tell you where they’ve gone
They’ll tell you where to go
But till you get there yourself you never really know
And where some have found their paradise
Others just come to harm
Amelia, it was just a false alarm. ~~~ Amelia, Joni Mitchell (1975)

DEP Rejects Enforceable Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reductions

DEP Admits Continued Reliance On and Expansion Of Fossil Power

 

On December 18, 2021, the Murphy DEP denied a petition for rulemaking filed by a coalition of over 50 climate, environmental justice, and environmental groups and activists (read the DEP denial). It is an incredible example of bureaucratic obfuscation and diversion.

We wrote about the petition when it was filed back in July and again in October when DEP cowardly postponed a decision before the election, see:

• After 4 Years Of Cheerleading And “Stakeholder” Diversions, NJ Climate Activists Finally Pull The Regulatory Trigger

• Murphy DEP Punts On Climate Emergency Rule Petition Seeking Deep Reductions In Greenhouse Gas Emissions

As far as I can tell, the NJ media – certainly NJ Spotlight – failed to cover the story .(i.e. when it mattered and could have made a difference in mounting public pressure: i.e. when the petition was filed and when it was delayed by DEP until after the election).

There are several critically important lessons to be drawn from the Murphy DEP denial:

1. Climate activists refused to publicly pressure the Governor with aggressive protest tactics. At the same time, groups I call the NJ Green Mafia (NJ LCV, Clean Water Action, NJCF, Environment NJ, NJ Audubon) repeatedly provided undeserved praise and political cover for the Governor.

With little or no activist protest and no media coverage, the Governor felt no pressure to approve the petition, especially when he was enjoying such robust green cover and a supplicant stenographic media who constantly praised his rhetoric.

2. The DEP denial exposes the sham of the entire Murphy DEP climate rhetoric and the hollow and self serving train of Executive Orders. Those Orders never had any teeth and the media and Green mafia duped the people of NJ about that fact.

3.  The DEP denial exposes the ideological and policy basis for the administration’s climate program, which, as I have written, are the Neoliberal pro-business anti-regulatory disaster of market driven, voluntary, and individual actions in pursuit of purely aspirational goals with huge government corporate subsidies (Orwellian incentives).

The DEP went out of their way to confirm this and stick a finger in the eye of activists, who DEP ridiculed as “simplistic”:

Back in the day, there used to be the concept of a “technology forcing” role for environmental regulations, where strict environmental standards would drive technological innovation and increase productivity (even Al Gore touted that). (That’s why NJ’s State Air Pollution Control Act has an “Advances in the art of pollution control“ standard, which, as I’ve written, DEP has ignored for decades). And before that, environmental regulations were considered part of what economist Lester Thurow  and others called old fashioned New Deal era “industrial planning” (which morphed into “industrial ecology” and then “sustainable development”). This is not some green leftist utopian environmental program, it has deep roots in political economy, most aptly in the “creative destruction” of economist Joseph Schumpeter. So, the poorly educated pompous Neoliberal Hayekian corporate hacks at DEP can take their “simplistic” smear and shove it.

5. The DEP denial exposes the fact that the Murphy Administration is committed to relying on and even expanding current fossil power for the “next several decades” – and that the projected doubling of electric demand will be fueled by natural gas (not off shore wind)

The term “dispatchable generation” gives the fossil game away (renewables are often not “dispatchable”). So does the requirement to “meet anticipated electric demand.”

6. The DEP denial exposes the fact – as I testified when the bill was under consideration, as I wrote when Gov. Corzine signed the bill into law  (my 10/7/07 Star Ledger Op-Ed: “No Teeth in ‘Tough’ Climate Law” link doesn’t work, but see this DKos post) and as I’ve been writing for over a decade – that the NJ Global Warming Response Act has no teeth and the GHG emission reduction goals of that law are purely aspirational and can not be enforced by DEP.

The DEP’s recently proposed CO2 emissions rule also validates this criticism, because, as I wrote, the DEP failed to link individual permit emissions with compliance with or attainment of Statewide GHG emissions reductions under the GWRA or Gov. Murphy’s Executive Order #274, as is done by NY DEC under NY climate law

7. The exact same criticisms applied to recent amendments to the GWRA, dubbed the NJ Clean Energy Act. That is another cynical Kabuki game. DEP was forced to admit this as well and did so openly: (p. 14-15)

The GWRA “appears” to provide regulatory authority? And then as soon as they make that equivocal statement, they quickly run away from any regulatory action.

8. Relatedly, very few people are aware of the fact that – despite the DEP Commissioner and the Gov.’s rhetoric and Executive Orders – the highly touted Murphy “environmental justice law” does not explicitly apply to or regulate greenhouse gas emissions. That effectively means that DEP EJ permit reviews will continue to ignore regulation of GHG emissions.

(we are now working on a post that will expose the fact that the recent DEP CO2 GHG emissions proposed rule totally ignores environmental justice concerns. The Cliff Notes version of that post goes like this: a) the Murphy EJ law applies only to certain DEP permits; b) those permits include for any: “Facility” means any:  (1) major source of air pollution”; c) DEP just proposed a regulation for CO2 air pollution emission from major sources and that proposal did not include any EJ concerns; and d) the EJ law did not amend the current DEP air permit regulations.; e) The new EJ law created an entirely new EJ DEP permit review process, parallel to pre-existing air permit regulations; f) The EJ law created a new “EJ impact statement”. DEP EJ permit decisions are based on the EJ impact statement and a series of complex, novel, and vague standards; g) As such, give all this, the EJ law will not be able to overcome the status quo, as DEP just revealed in their basis for denial of the climate petition. I’ve called the current fiasco for developing rules to implement the new EJ law a “wild-goose chase”.)

9. The DEP denial – exactly as I warned – exposes the fact that DEP has very narrowly interpreted their statutory authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

In the denial, DEP completely fails to assert jurisdiction to regulate greenhouse gas emissions under DEP land use programs and DEP fails to make the link (as NY State DEC has done) between greenhouse gas emissions and water resource impacts:

This dangerously narrow legal interpretation – coupled with DEP’s recent failure to regulate methane, failure to build a nexus between GHG emissions and water resource impacts, and the exclusion of GHG emission from the EJ law –  absolutely guarantees that DEP will continue to rubber stamp gas pipelines and other gas infrastructure (in contrast, while NY Sate DEC has denied fossil pipelines on the basis of greenhouse gas emissions and climate impacts on water resources).

In a deeply dishonest move, the DEP denial tangentially alludes to – but evades response to – the critically important issues of:

a) a scientific and regulatory nexus between greenhouse gas emissions and regulated water resource impacts; and

b) the regulatory authority to deny a permit based on GHG emissions and their relationship to and compliance with State GHG emission reduction goals:

DEP failed to respond to that. Those are core issues and HUGE gaps and loopholes in NJ law and DEP regulation.

10. The DEP denial exposes the Green Mafia cheerleaders, who have praised Murphy’s climate rhetoric and hollow Executive Orders.

11. Finally, the timing of the DEP denial also exposes the gaslighting manipulation and cynical news management at the Murphy DEP.

The DEP knew this denial would prompt widespread and strong criticism – as well as force media coverage of a story they have ignored.

Therefore, DEP was sure to issue a few “good news” smokescreen diversionary press releases about climate initiatives before the shit hit the fan. (a critique of DEP’s “carbon sequestration” strategy forthcoming).

And they did it just days before Christmas.

There can and should no longer be any doubt about the bullshit emanating from the Murphy DEP.

The Green masks are off and the Corporate and Wall Street fangs have been exposed.

Let’s hope that the Green  Mafia cheerleaders and the NJ media stenographers get the message.

Peter Kellogg’s Hudson Farm Funds Highlands Logging, Hunting, & Sham Carbon Markets

From Jane Addams and Benton MacKaye To A Wall Street Grift

The oblivious arrogance operating here is stunning.

If for the optics alone, didn’t DEP Commissioner LaTourette see a problem here?

NJ Gov. Murphy today issued the annual Governor’s “Environmental Excellence” awards.

I’ve previously noted how political those awards are, see:

• RGGI Is A Political Cover – Money Laundering Operation

This year, my eye caught this one, issued to a Wall Street billionaire and owner of Hudson Farm: (boldface mine)

HEALTHY ECOSYSTEMS & HABITATS: Hudson Farm

Hudson Farm operates as a year-round outdoor experience for its members on more than 4,000 acres of land in Sussex County. The farm manages its land voluntarily through its New Jersey-approved Forest Stewardship Plan, along with multiple associated and complementary voluntary conservation projects. This work has provided enormous regional ecological uplift over the years. This year, Hudson Farm voluntarily implemented ecological forestry practices on an annual basis including forest-stand thinning, integrated pest management, reforestation and invasive species controls, as well as stream and water quality restorations, riparian buffer work, wetland restoration and native grassland restorations to benefit various declining wildlife species. From October 2020 to October 2021, Hudson Farm and its partners implemented more than 130 acres and 1.5 miles of habitat restoration/stewardship on its property, as well as wildlife monitoring projects. The results were enhanced biodiversity, improved surface water infiltration, provided critical habitat, controlled soil erosion and sediment runoff, and diversified forest age-class to improve forest resiliency, carbon sequestration and improved nutrient cycling.

Let me translate that bullshit and tell folks what the DEP press release left out:

1) the “year-round outdoor experience” Hudson Farm provides is a private hunting club for elite members (they even brag of a heli-pad to wisk Wall Streeters to the Farm in just minutes). They manage their land to maximize hunting opportunities for their private members:

The Hudson Farm Club operates as a private year round outdoor experience for its members as one of the most attractive and challenging shooting layouts in the country since 1997

2) the “New Jersey-approved Forest Stewardship Plan” is part of a DEP scandal that promotes commercial logging under various guises, slogans and pretexts, like stewardship, sustainability, forest health, wildfire prevention, and habitat creation.

3) “ecological forestry practices and forest-stand thinning” are code for logging and maximizing game species habitat to promote hunting.

4) the “riparian buffer” work fails to note that under DEP’s Forestry Best Management Practices, riparian (stream side) buffer protections are only 50 feet wide, compared to regulatory protections they are exempted from, which are 300 feet wide for Highlands and Category One stream buffers.

5) Hudson Farm’s “partners” include NJ Audubon. Hudson Farm provided a huge $330,000 grant to NJ Audubon to conduct logging on public green acres acquired lands (e.g. Sparta Mountain Wildlife Management Area and other Highlands forests). NJ Audubon’s logging has been criticized by local activists, numerous scientists, and the Highlands Coalition for logging core Highlands forests – including a Forest Stewardship Council Audit.

NJ Audubon also formed a “partnership” with and received significant funding from Donald Trump. Recently, NJ Audubon hired a former Exxon-Mobil hack to lead their Corporate Stewardship program.

6) Hudson Farm owner billionaire Peter Kellogg also funded 15 DEP employees to attend a weeklong junket at $5,000 a head. I wonder if the Gov. is aware of this egregious conflict of interest?

7) “wildlife monitoring projects” are largely designed to promote hunting.

8) the mention of “carbon sequestration” fails to note that Hudson Farm is generating profits and economic benefits from participation in a sham carbon credit and offset market scheme. (Hudson Farm and Kellogg also may benefit from DEP’s climate PACT rules and RGGI sequestration and offset programs, two more egregious conflicts of interest)

9) Finally, DEP’s press release fails to note that Hudson Farm is owned by Wall Street billionaire Peter Kellogg (the place ironically began during the Progressive Era to benefit poor urban kids. Hit that link and read the history):

The Hudson Guild, a charitable organization who ran the property as a camp.

Notice how the DEP press release also fails to mention that the “camp” was for poor urban kids and part of the Progressive Era reforms and the politics of guilds. It was also the place where Benton MacKaye conceived the Appalachian trail. His regional planning philosophy and public interest ethic would be appalled  by the current Hudson Farm elite private enterprise and Gov. Murphy’ recognition of that. So, MacKaye and Jane Addams now join Mumford and McHarg in rolling in their graves.

10) Is Wall Street Peter a friend of Phil and Tammy?

The oblivious arrogance operating here is stunning.

If for the optics alone, didn’t DEP Commissioner LaTourette see a problem here?

Governor Has Not Withdrawn Corporate Nominees

Conservation Community Collapse And Capitulation Continue

Senate Could Still Confirm In Last Hours Of Last Session of Lame Duck

I just got an email from a Pinelands lover forwarding Carleton Montgomery’s (Pinelands Preservation Alliance) “update” on Gov. Murphy’s corporate scheme that the Star Ledger editorial board recently excoriated as “a craven power play”, a “brazen” attempt to “gut the Commission during lame duck”, and a “scheme” that was similar to the “bullying” by Gov. Christie.

No such criticism crossed Montgomery’s lips, which confirms my suspicion that he and Ed Potosnak of NJ LCV cut a dirty deal with the Governor.

So, in the midst of that collapse and dirty dealing, let me be clear: these corporate hacks have no business being on the Pinelands Commission and people should do everything in their power  to demand that the Gov. withdraw their nominations and the Senate to reject them.

Before I provide Montgomery’s complete “update” to PPA members, let me highlight the key points:

1) Despite the scathing criticism by the Star Ledger editorial board, Governor Murphy still has not withdrawn his corporate nominees, who remain pending Senate confirmation.

Thus, the power to make a final decision and determine the fate of the Pinelands Commission is in outgoing Senate President Sweeney’s hands, a man who is no friend of the Pinelands.

That is a complete abdication by Gov. Murphy.

2) Montgomery’s “update” continues a total collapse and capitulation to Gov. Murphy.

Montgomery suggests that a deal to appoint Murphy’s 2 previously nominated conservationists – who he never fought for over 4 years – would be acceptable and more than offset the 2 new corporate nominees.

Montgomery ludicrously suggests that this deal would make the Commission “stronger”.

Montgomery no longer criticizes the Governor’s corporate nominees as totally inappropriate. On December 3, 2021, he initially wrote:

In a truly shocking move, Governor Murphy today nominated three corporate lobbyists for the Pinelands Commission. They would replace three seasoned environmental leaders with years of service for the Pinelands.

All three of the new nominees appear to have fundamental conflicts of interest due to their employment as lobbyists for industry.  Only one of the three appears to have any prior interest at all in environmental protection.

Montgomery no longer criticizes the Gov.’s nominees as “corporate lobbyists” or complains that they have “fundamental conflicts of interest” – or describes the Gov.’s move as “truly shocking”.

Now, Montgomery lamely limits his concerns about the nominees on a very narrow basis:

because they would replace battle-tested environmental voices who are currently serving on the Commission.

How does one go from criticizing the Gov. move as “truly shocking“ and blasting his corporate nominees for having “fundamental conflicts of interest” and no “interest at all in environmental protection“, to cutting a dirty deal and suggesting it would make the Commission “stronger”?

Could that be because Montgomery himself has a shocking conflict of interest? (i.e. the deal he apparently cut and is now supporting includes Ms. Lettman? Ms. Lettman was a former employee of PPA and worked for Montgomery. [Note: – I support Ms. Lettman, but not Ms. Coffey. e.g. see this and this and  this  for examples of why.)

Could it be that Montgomery feels ashamed and needs cover for throwing 2 Pinelands Commissioners under the bus in his dirty deal?

Montgomery has completely collapsed and capitulated (along with NJ LCV and the rest of the NJ Conservation community, who apparently remain on the sidelines and continue to give Murphy a pass).

As even more evidence of that collapse, Montgomery now is silent on advising PPA member what to do. He takes a totally passive “wait and see” stance and does not urge his members to publicly oppose the Murphy scheme in any way.

That silence on advocating public opposition, coupled with abandoning criticism of the corporate nominees, plus the suggestion that 2 conservationists would make the Commission “stronger” and Montgomery’s failure to even mention the scathing Star Ledger editorial – which should be used to bludgeon the Governor – absolutely confirms that he made a dirty deal with the Murphy Administration at that Trenton meeting.

Here is Montgomery’s pathetically lame complete “update” – you can read it for yourself: (emphases mine) – and don’t miss how Montgomery merely names Gov. Murphy’s corporate nominees by name without noting their corporate affiliations (the ones he previously blasted). That is dishonest and manipulative gaslighting, at best:

We are writing to give you an update on the Pinelands Commission nominations.  There are currently four people nominated and teed up for confirmation by the State Senate:  Theresa Lettman and Jennifer Coffey, who were first nominated in 2019 and are highly qualified for the role; and Laura Matos and Davon McCurry, whom the governor nominated last week and who raise concerns in our minds because they would replace battle-tested environmental voices who are currently serving on the Commission.

There has been no movement on any of the pending nominees this week.  The Senate Judiciary Committee (a way station on the path to full Senate confirmation) met on Thursday, but did not address Pinelands Commission nominations.  The next scheduled committee meeting is on January 6^th, so it is still possible the Senate will act on some or all four of the pending nominations before the session ends on January 11^th.   After January 11^th, 2022, all nominations will expire, and the process will need to start anew in the new legislative session.

We’ll be back in touch as soon as we have more information.

PPA’s goal is to make the Pinelands Commission stronger than it is today, so it enforces the Comprehensive Management Plan consistently and rigorously, and adopts needed reforms to protect the aquifer and ecosystems, reinstates public participation rights it has quashed over the last several years, and begins to address climate change in the Pinelands.