Lawmakers close to blocking Christie's Highlands plans

Lawmakers are a step away from blocking Gov. Chris Christie’s plans to allow more residential development in the protected Highlands, a region where millions of New Jersey residents get their drinking water.

A Senate committee approved a resolution Monday saying a controversial move last year by Christie that would permit 1,145 more septic systems in the environmentally sensitive region goes against a 2004 state law that severely restricted development.

The measure needs approval from the full Senate to force Bob Martin, the Department of Environmental Protection commissioner, to amend or withdraw the proposed rules. The full Assembly passed it in December.

“The proposed new standards have the potential to add up to 12 percent more septic systems in the Highlands region, which would have an adverse impact on the quality of the drinking water available to a majority of our residents and run starkly counter to the original intent of the Highlands Act,” said Assemblyman John McKeon, D-Essex, who pushed for passage in his house.

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The septic rule was signed by Martin last week and would go into effect on June 5, when it is scheduled to be published in the state register, said Larry Hajna, a DEP spokesman.

Sen. Bob Smith, D-Middlesex, said it doesn't make a difference if the rules take effect. As long as the Legislature votes against the measure it will be "gone-zola," he said.

“Putting it out of committee sends a signal that the Legislature believes it violates legislative intent," said Smith, who heads the Senate Environment and Energy Committee.

Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club, agreed. "It's the right time to do this," he said. "The DEP is ready to move forward, and this can stop them."

Spanning 800,000 acres over seven counties, the Highlands is North Jersey’s premier water-generating region. It is dotted with reservoirs and vast aquifers that serve more than 5 million residents.

Landowners have complained for years that their property values have unfairly plummeted due to the development restrictions. The hardest hit were farmers whose large patches of land could have been developed into homes, strip malls or office parks. The state does not have enough money to fund the estimated $1.3 billion it would cost to preserve 92,360 acres of priority conservation lands and 70,197 acres of priority farmland.

Last year the Christie administration unveiled new rules for the Highlands that would allow more septics and thus more homes. DEP officials have said the Highlands can handle more nitrate pollution from septics than originally believed without water quality being substantially degraded.

The original Highlands plan, which called for one septic tank per 88 acres on forested land and one per 25 acres in open space, was not representative of the region because it was based on nitrate concentrations from only seven wells, DEP officials have said. New data were taken from 19,000 well samples.

Environmentalists and mostly Democratic lawmakers have called the DEP's findings flawed. The nitrate numbers were skewed because the study concentrated on wells near developed areas that already have septic systems and thus higher nitrate levels. That allowed the DEP to raise the bar on how much nitrate pollution the pristine areas could sustain before water quality would degrade, they said.