Ruling on VC Park Filter Plant Expected
Some See Hope in Boston Case, to be Decided May 5

By JORDAN MOSS

State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has urged the federal judge reviewing two local lawsuits aimed to stop the city from building a filtration plant at Mosholu Golf Course in Van Cortlandt Park to rule soon, according to an attorney for the plaintiffs.

The attorney, Howard Epstein, said Spitzer wrote Judge Nina Gershon to inform her that if a decision favorable to the plaintiffs came down too late, the current session of the state legislature would not be able to review the matter in its current session.

"If the court rules in our favor, and we lost this session, that will set back the whole process by many months," Epstein said, adding that he is optimistic that the court will rule by the end of the month.

The two suits, one filed by the Friends of Van Cortlandt Park and another by a group of Norwood residents, argue that the city acted unlawfully when it sited the plant in the park without seeking the approval of the state legislature.

Filtration opponents believe they have lined up the necessary support in Albany to scuttle the city's plans should the court rule in their favor. Earlier this year, local activists met with Sheldon Silver, the speaker of the state Assembly. Silver told the group he would defer to the local lawmaker affected, which in this case is Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, a staunch opponent of the plant.

Even in that event, foes of the plant may not be entirely out of the woods. The city could appeal an unfavorable decision to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.

Asked if the city would appeal, Inga Van Eysden, an attorney with the city's Law Department who argued the case in court, said it was a possibility, "maybe even a likely possibility, but it's not a decision that's been made yet."

Meanwhile, another suit being watched by local filtration activists will be decided in Boston on Friday. There, Massachusetts environmental officials are seeking to avoid building a filtration plant for the Boston area's water system. The state instead wants to build an ozonation plant, a much smaller facility.

"We have a technology that is better than filtration and we want to do that," said David Gilmartin, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority, a state agency.

Some local activists believe the suit is relevant because Judge Richard G. Stearns may give the state permission to avoid filtration despite a federal mandate from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to build a filtration plant.

New York City has similarly been ordered by the federal government to filter the Croton water system and in December 1999 the New York City Department of Environmental Protection announced its decision to build the plant in Van Cortlandt Park.

Karen Argenti, a veteran in the years-long local battle over filtration, thinks Judge Gershon, who also supervised the agreement between the city and the federal government, may even be looking to the Massachusetts case for guidance.

Gershon "didn't look at the question of whether [filtration] is good or bad, or what's the best way to keep the water clean," Argenti said. "It was never presented to her. She believes what the U.S. told her and they were wrong."

Epstein believes it is more likely that the judge has been delayed by other high-profile cases on her plate and that she probably didn't need guidance from a judge in another state to address the issue before her which is whether the city is alienating park land without the legislature's approval. "There is a lot of law in New York on this subject," Epstein said.

Ed. note: All articles on the filtration issue published in the Norwood News over the last two years are archived on the paper's Web site: www.bronxmall.com/norwoodnews. Click on "Ongoing Story" and then on "Filtration."

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