Ringwood Mines/Landfill site became the first site to be added to the National Priorities List after being removed from the list
On April 16, 2006. The decision to restore Ringwood’s Superfund status came after an investigation that was initiated by Stephen Sheller of Sheller, P.C.
This was the first instance of a site that had been removed from the Superfund list being re-listed and eligible again for federal clean-up funds.
Previous to Sheller’s efforts, the site had been removed from the list, leaving area residents susceptible to cancer, kidney and liver disease and other medical conditions that can result from exposure to toxic waste.
For 7 years, between 1967 and 1974, Ford Motor Company dumped car parts, solvents and lead-based paint sludge into Ringwood, New Jersey’s landfills and abandoned mine shafts. Industrial products were also dumped into wooded hollows and near streams which flow into the local reservoir.
In 2003, the EPA declared, ‘no elevated levels of hazardous substances remain at the site.’ Sheller, P.C. commissioned independent soil testing in 2003, reporting soil concentrations of lead in the Ramapough neighborhood of 118,000 parts per million, or 295 times the federal health standard for the residential area clean-up.
