Welcome to the pages of the Cancer cluster concern in Ocean County, NJ.

Please note that these pages have not been updated in two weeks (besides the bulletin board) I was scanning and putting on-line a 62-page document to help us to see what goes into analyzing our drinking water, and a step-by step rundown of the toxins and what they can do to you. I am in the process of cleaning up the charts, and adding links from the toxins on the Superfund page to their definitions. Please check out this document.It is most enlightening.

You can jump to one of several different sections, or you can read this little preamble I wrote.
The map here is from the Asbury Park Press. I apologize for its appearance. I got it as a photocopy and added the colors. The location of seven additional cases were not indicated.
Feel free to contribute to these pages my sending me e-mail: ev@gatherer.org.

Here's a short directory of these pages:
Finding answers: Any evidence, any history, any research, any statistics. This includes a borough-by-borough rundown of contaminated sites.

The latest news: 2 United Water wells shut down. list of events including political events which pertain.

Personal Opinions:

Good Ideas. Suggestions that anyone has on this crisis.

I've got my own task list. If anyone wants to help me, I'd be much obliged.

Contribute to the dialog. Voice your concerns, tell your story, help us solve this. This is a bulletin board.

I say this right off: If you've had your water, soil or air tested, and have the results, please contact me. I will post all results.

In case you're not familiar with the case, please read the article which was in the Observer on March 11. It was the first I heard of the crisis.

My Preamble

When my wife and I looked for a place to raise our children, we searched the whole Eastern seaboard. Of all the places we could have lived, we were convinced that this area is the most wonderful. The community is surrounded by unspoiled forest with cedar swamps, beaver dams and clear springs and cranberry bogs. A mile north we are in the middle of a bustling town with one of the best public libraries I've ever seen. The community is racially mixed, and lives in harmony and mutual respect. The cost of housing allows those of us who don't have much to dare hope to own a home. The schools are excellent, and the people are friendly and warm.

Besides loving the area, I feel that people are put here to do a job. You don't move into paradise, you make paradise by your own efforts. I have put up these pages so that people have a direct means of offering information. I don't want to panic the town, drive down property values, or even point a finger at the large corporations that have polluted the area. On my web site, everyone has the opportunity to present their side, without (much) prejudice. Though I have three young children, I will not move away from this area. After all, if we all keep running and don't stand to fight, pretty soon there'll be nowhere left to run to.

I am a man of strong opinions. For the sake of fairness, I will try not to let these opinions color these pages. It will be a clearinghouse. We need to identify the source of the problem and do something about it.

Whatever the outcome, the fact is that the State has identified over 200 contaminated sites in Ocean County, and that shames us all. Ben Franklin said that little strokes fell great oaks, and maybe we've been killing this town by degrees. Maybe it's happening all over. Maybe the whole thing is a statistical blip. That's what I want to determine by posting these pages. They are a gift to our town. If you have something to say, just e-mail it to me at: ev@gatherer.org.