Pallone Encouraged by Multi-Agency Status Report on Crumb Rubber used in Playing Fields and Playgrounds

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 3, 2016


WASHINGTON, DC – Congressman Frank Pallone, Jr. (NJ-06), who serves as Ranking Member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, today said he was encouraged by a status report from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) on recycled tire crumb used in playing fields and playgrounds. Pallone has been a leader in Congress in his efforts to examine the potential risks of crumb rubber, which led to a multi-agency action plan formed last February. The report is attached.

“I am encouraged by the work of numerous federal agencies to better inform the public on the impact of crumb rubber and any potential negative health effects on our children,” said Pallone. “This status report is an important resource and I look forward to the conclusions that the EPA and its partners will reach in the coming months.

“Parents sending their kids off to play and take part in athletics deserve the peace of mind that these surfaces are safe. Since crumb rubber is found in surfaces at schools and stadiums across the country, we need to be confident that there are no negative health effects of crumb rubber, and I’m hopeful this action plan will provide much needed answers about the safety of these fields.”

The agencies are conducting research focusing on evaluating the risk of exposures, identifying the chemical compounds found in crumb rubber, filling important data and knowledge gaps, and engaging stakeholders, such as parents, coaches, athletes, and state agencies to further assess any risks posed. The results of the synthetic turf fields research are expected to be finalized later in 2017.

In recent years there have been concerning reports regarding young athletes who have played on synthetic turf athletic fields containing crumb rubber being diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma and other blood cancers. Pallone has reiterated that more scientific study is needed to investigate this disconcerting link, and is hopeful that this multi-agency action plan will be able to conclusively determine the safety of crumb rubber.

In October 2015, Pallone led his colleagues on the Energy and Commerce Committee in sending a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy calling on the agency to examine the safety of crumb rubber. That same month, he also urged Committee Republicans to prioritize hearings to examine the safety of turf fields.

At a hearing in May 2015, Pallone questioned Elliot Kaye, Chairman of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), on the risks of crumb rubber in synthetic turf fields. Based on Chairman Kaye’s response, Pallone was able to gain clarity that a 2008 statement from CPSC that fields filled with crumb rubber are “OK to install, OK to play on” does not reflect the current views of the Commission. He also received a commitment that the CPSC would continue its work with federal agencies to review the issue.

Pallone also wrote to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ASTDR) to ask the agency to conduct an official study to examine whether synthetic turf athletic fields increase the risk of lymphoma, leukemia, and other blood cancers.

September 6, 2016 Middletown Township Committee Meeting

The September 6th meeting of the Middletown Township Committee lasted 18 minutes. It was quick and like most Workshop meetings not a lot of details or enlightening information came out of it. That is of course, if you consider the Township's plan of installing lighting on the Nut Swamp fields.

If you weren't paying attention, the discussion of the field lights  at Nut Swamp would have been missed. While discussing a grant for new LED lighting for the Middletown Library (6:11),Tony Fiore off-handily mentions a grant application for lighting at the Nut Swamp fields and that the Township should also look into LED lighting for them (6:38-7:25).

To me this is significant, lighting of sports fields is a potential hot button issue, you either like the idea because your kids or other family members get to play under the lights or you hate the idea because you live in or around the area and don't want your quality of life being effected by the noise, light pollution or additional traffic in the neighbor at night when your trying to relax after work or get the kids to bed. It's a discussion that the Township should have with the residents in the area and I don't believe that notices to the residents most affected have been issued to notify them of the plans. It should also be mentioned that money from a Grant isn't free money, it has to be paid back at some time.

Other items of interest discussed during the meeting included:

• An ordinance was adopted to enter an agreement with Middletown Emergency Medical Services.
• An ordinance was introduced to vacate a portion of Atlantic Ave.
• Resolutions were adopted to enter agreements with towns along the NJ Transit rail line where a high voltage power line is proposed to be installed. The agreements are to set aside funds to retain legal counsel and retain a utilities expert to oppose the installation.

As always, you can download a copy of the Meeting Agenda that contains the discussion items and the proposed resolutions and ordinances that were voted on or presented during the meeting. A box around an item is a link, bringing you further into the document to that resolution or ordinance. At the end of the resolution there will be a link bringing you back to the agenda. Attached to this agenda is also the monthly bill list, so that everyone can see how the Township is spending our tax dollars.

Township's New Field Permit Ordinance Adds $25,000 Expense to Lincroft Little League Budget

I was forwarded the following letter from a friend who lives in Lincroft last week and have been meaning to post it.

I wonder how the other sports leagues around town are going to deal with this, if it is going to cost the relatively small (in comparison to other organizations) Lincroft Little League an additional $25,000 a year to run their league what will it cost the larger leagues such as B.Y.A.A. or Middletown Babe Ruth?

As the person who forwarded me the letter so aptly stated, "One thing I have always observed in Middletown is that you don't mess with people's sports! This one is going to hurt for everyone, including the Township Committee. Scharfenberger may wake up one day to a thousand baseballs on his front lawn...it may get ugly!"

Dear Lincroft Little League Families:

The Board of Directors of Lincroft Little League hopes this letter finds you well. The Board is currently in the process of completing its offseason activities, with the goal of delivering a great 2013 season for your children. As part of this process, we felt it necessary to inform you of a new ordinance that was recently passed by the Middletown Township Committee, which will drastically increase the cost that Lincroft Little League pays for its field permits, and ultimately, will pass on additional registration costs that each family will have to bear for their child(ren) to participate in Lincroft Little League.

On December 17, 2012 the Middletown Township Committee unanimously passed ordinance 2012‐3074, entitled, “Ordinance Amending Recreation Fee Schedules Governing Field Facility Rental Permits”. A link to the full written ordinance will be included with this letter, but the material goal of the ordinance is for the town to begin charging every sports organization in Middletown Township a field permit amount equal to $20 per two hour block of field usage for ALL GAMES AND PRACTICES. The town plans to use the proceeds from this new permit program to create a township‐wide sports field improvement fund. On numerous occasions, the Board has asked representatives from the town how they plan to allocate funds from this program to actual field improvement projects, and they cannot answer us, as quite frankly, the town has not thought that far ahead. It appears the town wants to collect funds now and then figure out how to allocate those funds to actual projects later.

In passing this ordinance, the Middletown Township Committee has let down Lincroft Little League in a variety of ways:

1) While conceiving this ordinance, the town was open to working with the individual leagues to create an ordinance that would raise capital for the town to make improvements to fields, without becoming financially burdensome to the leagues. Representatives from our board were assured that the “bigger” leagues would be treated differently, as they tend to have more registrations, and would bear a much higher cost, than smaller leagues or independent teams. The town did not honor this, and as a result, the implementation of this ordinance will have the effect of becoming overly financially burdensome to the league.

2) Although the town recognizes that Lincroft Little League has done an exemplary job of self‐maintaining the fields and facilities at M.T.T. Park (the home of Lincroft Little League) at zero cost to the town, not all fields within Middletown have had the same level of upkeep. As such, Lincroft Little League will be expected to pay into this fund immediately, but cannot reasonably anticipate reaping any benefits from the town in the first few years as funds will be invested in other Middletown fields first.

3) The Board was told by the town that the motivation for this new ordinance was to align the town with other towns in Monmouth County that were charging similar permit fees for their fields. We have asked other leagues what they pay to their towns, and their answers were in direct contrast to what we were told by Middletown. Colts Neck, Eatontown, Manalapan, Tinton Falls, and Long Branch do not pay any permit fees. Freehold pays a permit fee to its town, but much less than what the Lincroft Board estimates its fees will be.

The Board projects that the league will incur a new charge of approximately $25,000 as a result of the implementation of this ordinance. The field permit fees are now the second largest expense in our budget, after the cost of uniforms and equipment. With approximately 800 children in the league, the fee amounts to about $30 per player. Because the ordinance was approved several weeks after the Board had opened registration, the 2013 registration fee does not cover this unexpectedly large expense. This leaves Lincroft Little League with a very large deficit for the 2013 season.

The Board is dealing with this problem in three ways:

1) We are lobbying township officials for some kind of action to reduce these fees. We have expressed our opposition to this ordinance to township officials in several forums and are attempting to explain to them how much of a burden these new permit fees would be for our league. We are working with officials in other large youth organizations in this effort. Board members attended the Township Committee meeting in December in which the ordinance was passed and spoke out about the financial burden. A small group of us met with township officials in January to reiterate our concerns and provide further details about the costs of the permit fees. We speak with the Recreation Department officials regularly about the fees. You can help in this matter by using the contact information below to call or email members of the Township Committee.

2) The board is looking for ways to cut costs in our budget.

3) If the permit fees are not significantly reduced by the township, we will be asking each family to pay $20 per player (maximum of $50 per family) to help alleviate the financial burden of this new expense. This payment will be collected by the league, but checks should be made out to the Township of Middletown, since all of this money will be going to the township.

Our goal for the season is to minimize the amount that we have to pay to the town, while maximizing the experience your children have come to expect. We would like to hear your thoughts on cost cutting measures that we could undertake. We could eliminate participation trophies, play fewer games overall, not make up rainouts, eliminate field and capital improvement projects, to name a few, but we do value your opinion on which cuts the Board should prioritize. Please send your thoughts to Don O’Rourke at president@lincroftlittleleague.org and Ron Antonelli at vp@lincroftlittleleague.org. We also urge you to send emails and letters to the Middletown Township Committee to let them know your opinions on this new ordinance, as well as to make the town understand that they need to cap the cost of the permits to alleviate the financial burden on the league. Their contact information is listed below:

Mayor Gerard Scharfenberger
Deputy Mayor Stephanie Murray
Committeeman Anthony Fiore
Committeeman Stephen Massell
Committeeman Kevin Settembrino

Link to contact the Township Committee (you can call or email through this link):
http://www.middletownnj.org/contact_us

Link to the ordinance:
http://cdn.gov‐ i.com/clients/28bd4cc0/files/000/023/714/original/9450bb4c7cdfbf323435096d03be136b.pdf?1354650711

Yours Truly,

The Lincroft Little League Board of Directors

12-17-12 Township Committee Meeting

While we're on the subject of township meetings, there was a meeting of the Middletown Township Committee last night. It was the last regularly scheduled meeting of the year for the Township Committee.

The meeting opened up with certificates of appreciation for members of the Township's building inspections department, who were named the Employees of the Month for their efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.

Public hearings were conducted and subsequently, ordinances were adopted to control the height of buildings in flood prone areas as outlined by FEMA and to increase the fees charged for the use of sports fields in the various parks. The new fees collected are to be used specifically to maintain the fields. A member of the public spoke and wanted more information about how these new fees will effect the leagues and their members, that use the fields.

Township Committee Comments start around the 25:30 comments were kept brief for the most part, with Committeeman Gerry Scharfenberger and Deputy Mayor Massell mentioning the tragedy that took place the last Friday,but if you've been living in a bubble for a few days you wouldn't have known that they were speaking about the Sandy Hook School shooting in Newtown Ct.  Mayor Fiore however cleared it up when he also mentioned the tragedy in Newtown and said the Middletown School Superintendent William George issued a statementt earlier in the day reassuring parents the safety of the districts 10, 000 students is his top concern.

Public Comments started at 33:40 into the meeting and a few residents were concerned about the new building outlines that FEMA now deems necessary in the wake of all the damage caused by Hurricane Sandy. Unfortunately, the Township Committee didn't have many good answers due to the newness of FEMA's just issued requirements.

There was also a question about one of the resolutions that was passed earlier in the night about the  issuance of a $14 million worth of notes, the notes are being issued to Middletown from Middletown. The Township decided to use funds from its surplus to purchase Storm Emergency Notes from itself in order to bridge the funding gap for storm related costs that the Township is waiting for from the State and Federal government. You can watch and listen to this explanation around 48 minutes into the video.

To end the meeting resident Richard Holder (think that was his name), who along with a neighbor and the foundations that they established, The Holder Foundation and the Scarey Foundation, donated $10,000 to the Middletown Sandy Relief Fund and certain first responders.

This donation was met with applause and gratitude from all those in attendance.



As always, you can download a copy of the meeting agenda that contains the discussion items and the proposed resolutions and ordinances that were voted on or presented during the meeting. A box around an item is a link, bringing you further into the document to that resolution or ordinance. At the end of the resolution there will be a link bringing you back to the agenda. Attached to this agenda is also the monthly bill list, so that everyone can see how the Township is spending our tax dollars.

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I've just noticed that the video is not working properly, there is audio but picture.  Sorry for the inconvenience I'll try to get it fixed.

Middletown Township Committee Meeting 10/1/12

Last Monday night  Oct. 1st, 2012, the Middletown Township Committee got together for their monthly Workshop Meeting. The meeting lasted just over an hour and turned out to be rather interesting.

After watching the video of the meeting 3 things that stood out:

There was a special hiring about the renewal of a license for some guys pawn shop in town. Evidently he purchased some jewelry from an undercover police officer without the proper documentation. This is a big NO-NO seeing how the jewelry could have been stolen. It stood out because I  and others have never seen such a hearing take place at a Township Committee meeting were there was police testimony and a shop owner pleading his case to keep his license. Ultimately the Township Committee voted to suspend or revoke the license.

Secondly, there was a discussion about administering a users fee to the various sports leagues that use Township parks. Currently, various township sports leagues pay only a nominal application fee to use the sports fields around town. The fees generated only amount to ~$10K a year, which is just a mere fraction of the amount it costs Middletown to upkeep the sports fields in town. That's way so many of the fields around town are in such disrepair, too much usage and not enough money coming in to fix them.

Janet Dellet, Director of Recreation, put together a study that show other towns in the area charge an hourly fee for the use of their township owned fields and if Middletown adopted such a fee schedule, the township could generate upwards of $300K yearly that could be used to upgrade and maintain the fields.

I think this is a good idea, but I would caution against raising these fees all at once. There is the possibility that by jacking up the user fees to quickly and steeply, some sports teams or leagues could not afford to play and the kids playing would be heart. A gradual increase of fees over the next 2 -3 years would seem appropriate.

Lastly, during the public comments portion of the meeting Linda Baum's questions about the use of  Bio Diesel were stunning! The township spent nearly $400K on vehicles a couple of years back toting how "Green" and cost effective they were to purchase. Now the story has changed and it has become evident that Gerry Scharfenberger's Green Team didn't do there homework or set in place a plan on how to maintain the fleet (the vehicles are not Bio Diesel compatible) and generate Bio Diesel on their own. It seems that it's more complicated than just thinking that collecting old veggie oil from local restaurants and filtering it before usage would be enough to get them by. A whole setup is needed to convert the used oil into a usable form suitable for todays more advanced diesel engines; the trucks purchased need to be retro fitted with different seals and gaskets. And to top it all off, there is now a market for used cooking oil, so the once thought of as free fuel is now to cost prohibitive to collect.

Once again, lack of planning on the part of the Township Committee has wasted the tax payers money.




As always, you can download a copy of the meeting agenda that contains the discussion items and the proposed resolutions and ordinances that were voted on or presented during the meeting. A box around an item is a link, bringing you further into the document to that resolution or ordinance. At the end of the resolution there will be a link bringing you back to the agenda. Attached to this agenda is also the monthly bill list, so that everyone can see how the Township is spending our tax dollars.