By David Cruz
Correspondent
There was a time — long ago — when Bayonne was a popular North Jersey resort town, complete with rides and other waterfront amusements.
“There was actually beaches and hotels like you would see down the Jersey Shore today,” recalls Mayor Jimmy Davis.
But that was more than half a century ago. Bayonne today is a town surrounded by oil refineries that have left its once celebrated shoreline, fouled with oil and chemical waste. The state sued ExxonMobil, which ran a refinery operation here for decades, back in 2004. With a judge’s ruling on damages near, the Christie administration announced that it had reached a settlement for $225 million. Critics were aghast, saying that a settlement of closer to $9 billion was more appropriate. Many of those critics were at today’s Assembly Judiciary hearing.
“Gov. Christie is settling for a lot less than $225 million,” said Sen. Ray Lesniak, who led off today’s hearing. “They’re also giving Exxon a tax break to throw on top of it. They’re throwing in 16 other sites, hundreds of gasoline stations. It’s a total giveaway and we have to stop it and I believe we will.”
Gov. Chris Christie says the media has misreported the settlement — which is awaiting approval from the judge — and that critics refuse to see the real benefits of the deal.
“They’re going to have to clean everything up, no matter what it costs, and we’re going to get $225 million on top of it because they were bad enough to have done it in the first place,” he told a town hall meeting last month.
Democrats in the Legislature have been gathering petitions and holding hearings like this one, in an effort to get enough residents of the affected areas, which includes nearby Linden and Elizabeth, to put pressure on the judge before he rules later this summer.
“I think that Bayonne has contributed so much to Exxon and the wealth of this company,” said resident Marion Clooney. “They owe us to have a remediation of the soil, and we demand it, as citizens of Bayonne, who have contributed so much to Exxon.”
In addition to taking the short money, say critics, the Christie administration is proposing taking a big chunk of the proposed settlement and using it to close budget holes.
“When all is said and done, only $50 million will be available to deal with the restoration and other damaged areas,” said committee chairman Assemblyman John McKeon. “It’s just not correct.”
Nobody expects Bayonne to return to its days as a resort town, but residents here say it’s not too much to ask that they have access to their natural resources once again and that the company that polluted their town to pay its fair share to clean it up.