Monmouth County Planning Board to target storm water

Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 01/16/07

BY BOB JORDAN

FREEHOLD BUREAU

The Planning Board has its annual organization meeting at 1 p.m today in the conference room in the Hall of Records Annex on East Main Street.

Several reappointments to the board recently made by the county Board of Freeholders will be enacted, including three-year terms for members Joseph Rettagliata, who has been chairman, and Paul Kiernan Jr.; and one-year terms as board citizen alternates for Vincent Domidion II and Rick J. DeNoia Jr.

Rettagliata, who just turned 81 and for years ran Strathmore Cleaners on Route 34 in Aberdeen, has been a board member since 1982 and first served as its chairman in 1988.

The leadership positions for the board are picked by members every January.

Rettagliata said he would like to remain chairman.

"That will be up to the members if they pick me," he said.

The board meets monthly. At the December meeting, Freehold Township became just the sixth municipality to gain board approval of its stormwater-management plan.

Rettagliata said he is hopeful the remainder of the county's 53 towns will follow suit.

Municipalities were supposed to adopt ordinances by last April to implement the plans. The other municipalities that have complied are Holmdel, Marlboro, Roosevelt, Rumson and Shrewsbury.

Storm water is a major source of water pollution in New Jersey, and municipal efforts are an important part of the decades-long fight for cleaner water, according to officials, who added that some efforts, such as street-sweeping and upgrading catch basins, are under way.

At the time of the last board meeting, there were 23 municipalities that hadn't submitted plans to the county Stormwater Technical Advisory Committee for initial reviews. State officials said municipalities that don't have approved plans could be fined, but to date no fines have been issued, and state officials have not set a deadline for when penalties might be imposed