Construction of Stormwater Basins to Address Pollution

Stormwater basins designed to let plants eat nitrogen from runoff before it gets to Barnegat Bay and aggravates the overfeeding of that estuary are likely to get $7.4 million in state funds, low, or non-interest loans from the Christie administration.

It is part of the governor’s pledge to provide $10 million in grants and up to $100 million in low interest funds to improve water quality in the bay, according to Ocean County Freeholder Gerry P. Little.

The county is actually getting more money that it anticipated. Recently the forecast was that four of the 28 basins for which county officials sought funds would get them. Instead eight have made it through the screening process for full funding or low or interest-free loans, while 25 of the 28 are getting some support from the state, according to county Engineer Frank Scarantino.

Most of the basins are in Toms River. The Toms River watershed has been identified by scientists as the biggest contributor of nitrogen, chiefly from lawn fertilizers, in the Barnegat Bay watershed.

In line for $4 million in state grants are five basins, four of them in Toms River. They are located off Todd Road southwest of Mink Court near the Garden State Parkway, off Coolidge Avenue east of the Toms River High School East track and field area, on the southeast corner of Whitesville Road at Sunset Avenue, and on Vermont Avenue opposite Cynthia Lane.

The fifth basin is located at the northwest corner of Trenton Avenue and Hoyt Street in Lacey Township.

Scarantino said three basins at Ocean County College are in line for a combination of $850,000 in grants and low or no-interest loans amounting to $3.4 million. In addition to the grants, half the cost will be in interest free loans, and the remaining 25 percent of the cost in low interest borrowing.

The basins are needed to handle increased stormwater runoff at the college due to the contruction of a $30 million academic building for the Kean at Ocean partnership and associated parking lots and new roads.

The basins will be like "artificial wetlands,’’ explained Freeholder Director Joseph H. Vicari, with plants consuming the nitrogen and keeping it out of the bay.

Scarantino said the final paperwork for the state funds will be submitted by Sept. 1, with the county anticipating it will be able to get bids for the work in October.