The park has become an even more sacred waterfront oasis in the aftermath of September 11. The NJ World Trade Center Victims Memorial Commission is deciding on a public meeting date. However, the park's Development Corporation is persisting in their new assault on the public's free use of, access to, and enjoyment of our special New Jersey state park.
Your action is urgently needed to urge Governor James E. McGreevey to uphold the NJDEP's November, 2001 rejection of the Development Corporation's Commercial Summer Concert Series.
Your voice is important if we are to stop the the confiscation of the park on concert days by the inevitable traffic jams and road closings.
Please read the
summary of this fight in the Governor's letter.
Send Two Messages to Governor McGreevey
Please ask Governor James E. McGreevey to
1) uphold the NJDEP's rejection of the commercial concert series, and
2) end the Development Corporation's contract with NJDEP
| via email | via phone | via postal mail |
| click here and fill out the email form that will appear. | Call 609-292-6000. Ask for a Governor's Aide and give him or her your message for the Governor. | Governor
James E. McGreevey PO Box 001 Trenton, NJ 08625 |
After the NJDEP's November rejection of the Development Corp.'s summer-long half-million-dollar stage and commercial concert series, the Development Corporation tried to get Acting Governor Donald DiFrancesco to over-rule the rejection and prevent any public hearing. An aide of the Acting Governor reported that the Development Corporation president Peter Ylvisaker was calling every 5 minutes on Governor DiFrancesco's last days in office.
We're sure that the Development Corporation with its wealthy developer/promoter and other power broker/political allies (one of its Board members is the new Hudson County Executive Bernard Hartnett) is now aggressively pressuring Governor James McGreevey to approve their traffic jam-causing commercial concert series despite the DEP's rejection and despite 25 years of public consensus for a free, accessible, non-commercialized park. We strongly support all sorts of free cultural events, which draw hundreds, not thousands of people.
The park's 251 acre interior is now protected as a 190 acre nature preserve with future nature trails, and a 60 acre open space perimeter. The US Army Corps of Engineers has just started feasibility studies for the nature restoration. The Interdisciplinary Planning Committee hopes the Design Competition starts this Spring.
We feel that the Development
Corporation desperately wants to get their way after the public defeated their
golf course and commercial waterpark plans. Let's stop them again!
Sincerely,
The Friends officers
Sam Pesin, president
Michel Cuillerier, 1st vice-president
Eliza Wright, 2nd vice-president
Eleanor Traina, secretary
Mildred Shapiro, treasurer