Paterson Flooding
Many properties outside of mapped flood hazard areas are damaged by floods, as maps are often inaccurate. In 2024 and 2025, the PRC will work with Paterson neighborhoods and partners to document where floods take place both within and outside mapped flood hazard areas, using photographs, online tools and social media. Photographs are accepted through the Paterson FloodShots website. We will work with the neighborhoods and government agencies to improve flood awareness, reduce property damages, and improve local responses during and after floods. This project is funded by the NY/NJ Harbor Estuary Program, with supplemental funding from the PSEG Foundation. We are also working with Paterson Schools on green stormwater projects at JFK High School and, as a subcontractor to WSP, Inc., on a project for the City of Paterson to identify good sites for additional green stormwater infrastructure, as part of the answer to combined sewer overflows.
Reducing Flood Damages
The Passaic River Basin regularly experiences major flood damages because development in our historic cities and later suburbs encroached into wetlands and flood plains. Since 1936, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has attempted to identify projects that would reduce major flood damages. Some smaller projects have been completed or will soon be constructed for tributary rivers (e.g., Molly Ann Brook, Ramapo River, Peckman River), but no structural project for the major flooding areas would provide significantly more benefits than the costs, making federal funding very difficult. Rather than waiting more decades for some possible future project, the PRC encourages smaller, local efforts that can reduce flood damages and flood anxiety. These include much greater use of Blue Acres funds to remove homes that are frequently flooded, benefiting both homeowners and emergency services. We also recognize the benefits of local structural solutions in some cases. We advocate for the use of sound science to avoid “solutions” that really don’t address the problems. Read more about our analysis and positions regarding flooding issues.
Stormwater Management & Watershed Improvement Plans
The NJ Department of Environmental Protection’s new MS4 (municipal separate storm sewer system) permit requires, every municipality in the Passaic River Basin to improve the mapping, maintenance and improvement of their stormwater systems. They also must develop municipal Watershed Improvement Plans that identify critical actions to reduce water pollution and stream damage from stormwater discharges. The PRC is working within the Basin and with watershed associations and others across New Jersey to encourage cost-effective approaches and municipal collaboration on watershed-based Watershed Improvement Plans to achieve better water quality.
Open Space Stewardship
The PRC directly preserved more than 1600 acres of land for permanent open space, and many more with other non-governmental partners. While some properties have been transferred to municipal and county parks, the PRC manages roughly 1200 acres of open space. These lands require stewardship to reduce illegal uses such as motorized off-road vehicles, correct property hazards such as dead ash trees, and prevent encroachments by neighboring property owners. Read more about our Land Trust.
Historic Stewardship
The PRC owns Willow Hall, its Morristown headquarters, a National Historical Register site highlighting the connection between environmental conservation and historic preservation. Built in 1847 by George Vail (Speedwell Iron Works, U.S. House of Representatives), Willow Hall, as with all historic buildings, presents constant challenges such as increasing costs of insurance, operations, maintenance, repairs and restoration. Read more about Willow Hall.
Local Government Committee
The PRC is creating a new Local Government Committee that will focus attention on critical water issues facing local communities, including drinking water contamination and treatment, flood damage mitigation, riverside parks improvements, protection of water supplies, and more. The Local Government Committee will build on our past successes with municipal and county governments through the Passaic Valley Ground Water Protection Committee (Central Passaic Basin) and the Passaic River Restoration Project committee (Lower Passaic River). Our program agenda in 2024 will include innovative approaches for PFAS in drinking water and how flood damages change our communities.
Hazardous Waste Sites
The PRC has long advocated for cleanup of hazardous waste sites throughout the Basin, from the Ford Company contamination of groundwater in Mahwah and Ramapo that harms the local indigenous population to the dioxin contamination of the Lower Passaic River in and near Newark. We continue to focus on these issues.
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