NJBIA, representing 16,500 employers throughout New Jersey, is-alongwith the State AFL-CIO-leading a coalition of labor and business organizationsopposed to the rules.  NJBIA submitted 40 pages of comments on Monday,Oct. 2, the official close of the comment period on the proposal.

 "Based on the quantity of comments by our members and the magnitudeof general public dissatisfaction with the proposal, NJBIA requests thatthe proposed rules be withdrawn and resubmitted after legislative reviewand authorization, additional stakeholder meetings and a thorough redraftingof the details," NJBIA said in its written comments.  "We believethat if these rules are implemented in their present form, they will createa stalemate in rural areas and threaten major development in the urbanareas of the state." 

NJBIA First Vice President Jim Sinclair said the coalition supportssound and effective environmental policies but that DEP's proposal doesnot further the public interest.

"Not since the healthcare reforms of 1992 have labor and business joinedtogether on a single issue of this magnitude," Sinclair said.  "Employersand organized labor agree that the proposed rules are unsalvageable andshould be scrapped."

"The proposed rules would be devastating to the local economy and subjecteven individual homeowners to an unwieldy bureaucracy," Sinclair added. "Decision-making authority would be concentrated in the DEP with no meansof appeal.  And the proposal contains no objectives or goals for dealingwith existing sources of pollution." 

"In short, this is a recipe for disaster," he said.

Among NJBIA's concerns are:

Inadequate provisions for transition of existing housing anddevelopment projects in septic areas;
Repeated expansion of department authority beyond that specified infederal and state statutes and regulations;
 Consolidation of "Czar-like" development control within DEP;
 Lack of technical or scientific basis for requirements;
 Inconsistencies with other existing state regulatory programs;
 No stated objectives or goals for dealing with existing sourcesof pollution;
 No consideration of economic factors in wastewater planning;
 Prohibition on interested parties from applying for amendments,putting all activities at the discretion of planning entities with potentialconflicting interests;
 A retroactive implementation date;
 Subjects activities at even one residence to all provisions ofthe rules on septics, while exempting old cesspools built before therewere standards; 
 No means of appeal for decisions or inaction by any planningagency or the DEP; and 
 Possibility of new regulatory requirements without any publicinput. 

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