New Jersey Clean Communities Council Awards $27M in Litter-Abatement Funding

WOODBRIDGE – Mayor John McCormac said Woodbridge has created a calendar that reminds residents of important dates, such as trash, recycling, and leaf pickups and shredding events.

Mayor Brian Wahler said Piscataway organized an Earth Day cleanup in which 200 volunteers of all ages helped clean along the Raritan River.

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Mayor Dahlia Vertreese said Hillside has launched a beautification initiative that includes planting flowers near roadside signs welcoming visitors to the township.

Mayor André Sayegh said his city has launched the “Paterson is Picking Up” anti-litter initiative.

Mayors and other representatives of dozens of municipalities who gathered Wednesday to collect their share of the $27 million in funding from the New Jersey Clean Communities Council (NJCCC) used the occasion to swap suggestions and trade tips on how to best use their newfound windfalls.

Mayor Ted Gamble of Bloomfield, Sayreville Councilwoman Donna Roberts and others who were on hand at the Avenel Performing Arts Center were presented with ceremonial oversized checks by NJCCC Executive Director JoAnn Gemenden.

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The grants, which also include about $3 million to county governments across the state, are earmarked for litter abatement, education or enforcement.

“But, there are a lot of innovative ways you can use your funding that still meet these targets,” Gemenden said. “Did you know you could use your grant money for stormwater compliance? That’s a big mandate that a lot of towns have to do now with the new permitting. You can use up to 25% of your grant for stormwater management.”

Gemenden also said the grant money could be used to purchase surveillance cameras to monitor spaces where illegal dumping often occurs or to fund liter-themed educational school trips to set up dog waste stations stocked with recycled bags in public spaces.

The funding that was distributed on Wednesday was generated through a tax on manufacturers, wholesalers or distributors of 15 categories of litter-generating products in New Jersey.

Grant amounts are based on population, housing units and miles of municipally owned roadways. In addition, penalties collected from enforcement of the single-use plastic law will also be allocated to the NJCCC fund.

Seth Hackman of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, which oversees the Clean Communities Council, ticked off some of the amazing ways their partnership has helped make the state cleaner and greener over the past eight years.

More than 350,000 volunteers have participated in more than 270,000 cleanups, working on nearly 600,000 miles and more than 1.6 million acres of land, he said. More than 500,000 tons of debris has been collected and more than 50,000 litter citations and violations have been issued.

“Just to say again, because it’s such an amazing statistic, New Jersey has eliminated over 13 billion single-use plastic bags from grocery stores alone from our environment over the past years,” Hoffman said.

That’s important because, as Wahler put it, combating litter is a never-ending battle.

“One thing that really annoys the heck out of me is that as much as local officials try to get residents or even folks that are traversing through communities, to don’t litter,” he said. “There are so many programs out there on the local level to encourage residents to responsibly get rid of debris, litter and things like that. But yet, you clean a large roadway up, or like we clean up Route 18 and then within 24 hours it looks like we weren’t even there.”

But Whaler vowed, “We’re not giving up.”

Neither is Linda Doherty, the president of the board of trustees at NJCCC, who warned that a bill introduced in the state Legislature earlier this month could threaten all the progress towns such as Piscataway, Sayreville and others have made with the NJCCC funding.

Under the Beverage Container Deposit Act, when a retailer buys beverages from a distributor, they will pay a 10-cent deposit for each container. Then, the customer will pay an extra 10 cents per container when they purchase the beverage. When the container is empty, the customer can return it to the store and be reimbursed 10 cents for each container.

“That would disrupt and undermine New Jersey’s successful curbside recycling program by diverting these recyclable items and resulting in the suspension of this litter tax,” she said. “And without this revenue source, the Clean Communities Council program will be virtually eliminated, along with the funds distributed to your towns and counties.”

Edison ($235,427) will be receiving the biggest NJCCC check among Middlesex County municipalities, followed by Woodbridge ($230,710). Piscataway will get $131,656, Sayreville will get $103,968 and Perth Amboy will get $90,548.

For the town-by town and county-by-county breakdowns of NJCCC funding awards, click here .

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