Environmental Commission focuses on projects around town
Page 4 • Wednesday, February 18, 2015 • The Hammonton Gazette
TOPICS, from Page 1
a presentation to members of the commission on the proposed projects for Hammonton this year, giving an update on the
William Penn Foundation’s $35 million,
multi-year initiative to protect and restore
crucial sources of drinking water for millions of people in the tri-state area, and
scheduling a workshop at town hall in the
next few months on the water conservation
project.
“What we are working on now is a threeyear phase, but we fully expect for them
[William Penn Foundation] to fund the
work for at least 10 years. Our partner for
the project is the Pinelands Preservation Alliance. Other partners of the project include
Chris Jage of New Jersey Conservation
Foundation, and the William Penn project
will supplement the other federal/state initiatives. There will be other projects that
come along also. In Hammonton our project is water conservation. Hammonton has
already done a fabulous job on working to
detect the water supply for residents, agriculture and your business community. Jody
[Carrara] will cover the Hammonton Rebate Program. We want to get the word out
to residents on that so that they take advantage of it,” Reardon said.
According to Hammonton Public Works
Manager/Business Administrator Jerome
Barberio, he has received and reviewed
more than 30 water tax rebate forms from
residents so far.
“We included the rebates in the utility
bills, so people have filled them out
and brought them in. Some were a
little confused because they had not
read the ordinance and thought they
can go back to 2006, 2007, 2008
and 2009 to get the rebate and in
fact the ordinance just passed on
December 16, 2013. That is when
it started. Our grant was received
shortly after that because the town
was going to fund it with some recommittee money and some utility
money, a couple of $1,000 each.
But Dan Bachalis wrote the grant to
Sustainable Jersey and they gave us
$10,000 to promote and rebate the
residents that have energy savings.
We have recently processed three
more so we are over 30. We will
continue to push it,” Barberio said.
The ANJEC representatives
shared their objectives, along with
the Pinelands Preservation Alliance
[PPA] for the year with the commissioners in attendance. Some of
the proposed projects for the town
are residential water conservation
brochure and canvassing, promoting water conservation with businesses, and working with
MainStreet Hammonton on the effort, to promote conservation and
native plants and community and
public outreach.
On Thursday, May 7, a workshop
for the projects and conservation
water initiative is tentatively scheduled to take place in town hall.
Robert Vettese of ARH made a
short presentation to the board, updating members about the continued removing and replanting of
trees along the Grape Street and adjacent road reconstruction project,
and what is next. Vettese outlined
some items that will take place by
next month into April for Pratt
Street.
“The goal is to have the contractor, weather permitting, should
have the entire sanitary sewer in by
sometime next month. Right now
they are working between Third
Street and Second Street,” Vettese
said.
The trees will be replanted in
spots where they are not too close
to driveways, wires and other utilities, according to Vettese.
“We are pretty much limited to
where we will put these trees. I
have a list of approval of trees and
a second list of rejection of trees.
Right now we have three people on
Second Street that said they didn’t
want trees replanted back on the
property. We did have someone that
said they would take additional
trees for those that don’t want
them,” Vettese said.
Vettese said that residents along the road
reconstruction site will be notified of the
tree replanting process by late March, early
April.
“We will contact the residents to make
sure they want the trees installed, and if not,
we will get it installed in the best location
we can. I think what we are going to have
to do is design a sheet that says they don’t
want a tree, so we will try to accommodate
the resident as much as possible…This will
probably not occur until April. They will
probably receive a notice about the trees
sometime in late March, into the beginning
of April and we will take it from there,”
Vettese said.
There was also an update on the potential
Valley Avenue reconstruction. Vettese said
it could be the same type of program currently takin