Politics & Government

School Board VP Now GEMS Trustee

Kevin Bucceroni, vice president of the Black Horse Pike Regional School District Board of Education, is now the township's GEMS trustee.

The Township Council approved as part of its consent agenda Monday night a resolution appointing Kevin Bucceroni as the township's new trustee on the Gloucester Environmental Management Services, or GEMS, landfill.

Bucceroni, vice president of the Black Horse Pike Regional School District Board of Education, replaces Dennis L. Riley, who was removed as township trustee by resolution under the same consent agenda Monday.

Council President Glen Bianchini indicated township officials made the move to have a "different pair of eyes" to look at the township's obligations relating to the Superfund site.

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"The person we're putting on has been on our school board, has dug through a lot of things, and has, quite honestly, made some nice things there," Bianchini said. "So we're asking him to take a look at this from his eyes instead of the eyes of the previous person."

South Jersey Citizens took exception to the appointment being included among the consent agenda's items prior to being discussed by Council members in a public forum.

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Erial resident Tom Crone, executive director of the government watchdog group, argued the public should have been given an opportunity to hear Council members' discuss the proposed change of GEMS trustees before hearing them vote for or against a consent agenda that included several measures.

"Maybe you need to take this out of the consent agenda, put it up for public consumption, have a discussion about it—maybe an open debate based on the people who were here tonight because of the 26,000 gallons of diesel fuel dumped into our waterways," he said.

"This is not to denegrate Mr. Bucceroni," he added. "He can have the job. I think he's done a heck of a job at the school board. ... However, there is such a thing as a process, and the public is to be a part of this process."

Mayor David Mayer countered that the public is availed time to discuss and ask questions of Council members on any measure approved in the consent agenda. He noted the same process was used to appoint Riley as trustee in 2003.

"I think it was an open process then, and I don't think this is a closed process at all," the mayor said.

Bianchini and Solicitor David Carlamere both noted Council members can ask to have measures removed from the consent agenda and voted on separately.

Councilman Dan Hutchison made a motion to have the measures pulled from the consent agenda—"Although I don't believe it needs to be removed, I don't believe it will hurt to remove it," he said—but not until after Council Vice President Orlando Mercado had already moved the consent agenda.

Mercado was not willing to withdraw his motion, and the consent agenda was unanimously approved, 7-0.

More information about GEMS, including reports from the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), can be found on the GEMS Trust's website.

GEMS, a 60-acre property monitored by the EPA since 1980, is located on the northwest corner of the intersection of Hickstown and New Brooklyn-Erial roads.

In 1980, a variety of industrial waste, including absestos and pesticides, were found to have been improperly disposed of on the GEMS property in the 1970s. A federal court's 1996 decree named the township as one of a handful of defendants required to support the trust's remediation efforts.

Council in June voted to approve a $1.2 million bond to cover the cost of the latest GEMS "cash call."


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