A Brief History of the Ringwood Mines/Landfill Site (by Wenke Taule)

Two important facts to bear in mind: The Ringwood Mines/Landfill Site is the only superfund site in the history of the program to be re-listed after deemed clean. And it is the only superfund site where people lived while toxic dumping took place.

1965---Ford Motor Co. purchases historic iron mines (900 acres) in Upper Ringwood. Ford begins dumping toxic sludge from their Mahwah Plant all over Upper Ringwood. Trucks come at all hours of the day and night, right past borough hall.

1965-1973—Ford continues dumping sludge throughout Upper Ringwood.

1970---Ford begins to divest of its 900 acres in Upper Ringwood. 290 acres, including all the historic homes, were donated to Ringwood Borough. 227 acres were sold to High Point Homes, which is now Ringwood’s industrial area. 208 acres were sold to Jersey Central for high-tension wires.

1973—With their (Ford and Ringwood Borough) plans for a legal landfill nixed by the NJDEP and the North Jersey Water Commission for fear of water contamination, Ford donates the rest of their land--- 108 acres to the State of NJ and 32 acres to How-To Inc. How-To is a federally funded program, which helped qualified families build their own homes. Ringwood foreclosed on the 32 acres in the early 1990's for lack of payment of taxes. This is a questionable foreclosure since it seems as if the owners of the land was the federal government.

1976—Ringwood Borough’s illegal landfill was closed down by the NJDEP.

1984---After years of complaints by the residents of continued and obvious contamination, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) lists the Mines/Landfill Site on the National Priority List. Ringwood Borough is against the listing.

1994—The EPA deems the Mines/Landfill Site clean. Ringwood officials were silent regarding the de-listing, instead ceding this important decision to the borough engineer. Their own Environmental Commission was skeptical that the site was clean.

1994-2001---The EPA directed Ford Motor Co. to do four more clean ups of the site.

2006--- After years of fighting for justice with no support from their local officials, the Upper Ringwood Community finally gains support from the newly elected Democratic council, and convinces the EPA that the site has to be re-listed on the National Priority List. NJDEP is supportive of the community and supports the re-listing. Congressman Scott Garrett admonishes previous Ringwood officials, stating that if they had just walked through the community they would have seen the sludge. It was clearly visible throughout the community. 

2006—The EPA Community Advisory Group (CAG) is started to address the distrust between the EPA and the residents of Upper Ringwood. During the first clean up, the EPA never spoke to the affected residents.

2007—Borough Attorney Maraziti threatens insurance carriers with a lawsuit. Carriers then agree to pay for Ringwood’s superfund legal, engineering and defense costs. Ringwood’s indemnification coverage is over $80M.

2012—Ringwood Borough holds a public meeting, where their environmental professionals recommend to the EPA and the public capping of the superfund site. The first mention of a recycling center at the O’Connor site is at this meeting.

2006-2014—For eight years members of the CAG have recommended the entire clean up of the superfund site. Tons of sludge has been removed, but many more tons of sludge remain. The EPA was clear that there would be no full clean up of the Cannon Mine or Peters Mine, but that there would be a full clean up of the O’Connor landfill. The 12 acre O’Connor site was to be cleaned and brought back to its original vegetative state. 

2014—Ford and Ringwood balk at the O’Connor clean up plan and propose capping and building a $5M recycling center on top of the contamination--- saving millions for Ford. The EPA agrees and Ringwood now has 6 months to obtain needed permits. The NJ DEP and Governor Christie also support capping the contamination in place, a complete reversal of the state’s previous position of a full clean up.