New Jersey Nightly News; New Jersey Nightly News Episode from 07/13/1981

Here's Don Torrance. Getting a pipeline completed just today to reopen New York's water supply system has sprung a leak. In sports Bill Perry has the cosmos highlights along with the weekend sports wrap up and we'll update the Renaissance Newark project in our closer look segment tonight. There has been another rupture in the Newark water system this time it's blamed on aging pipes. City engineers were rushing to get the system repaired when a section of older pipes burst flooding local highways. Brad Wells reports. A water supply line ruptured less than two miles east of the Quantock watershed today sending thousands of gallons of water over an embankment and flooding some sections of Route 23. According to construction workers on the scene the break in the line occurred when workmen attempted to reactivate the water system's network of pipelines partially destroyed last week. Eight hundred feet of new pipeline had been installed and water pressure was almost a full force today when an older section of underground pipe caved in. Problems of the Quantock watershed began last Tuesday when John Stringer James Caan Christopher Leger and Stephen black all aquatic residents reportedly opened a valve at the

watershed sending a one day supply of water gushing through the lines at full force. Repair work was ahead of schedule and water flowed through the system for the first time in nearly a week earlier today. The new section of pipe withstood the water pressure without any problems but apparently an older section of the system couldn't stand the new pressure. Engineers had been hoping to have the Newark water system completely restored by Wednesday but now they have no estimate of how much today's events have set them back. I'm Reggie wells. Striking Atlantic County court workers have been defying a back to work order since last Thursday. Well today they decided to return to work rather than face prosecution but the remaining strikers in that county say they are going to stay out. The two sides will sit down together for the first time in weeks but no one is predicting a quick settlement. Dan Hodgson has more. Hundred of the striking members of the Teamsters Local 331 or judicial workers. It's against the law for them to strike. They're under the jurisdiction of county assignment judge Philip grew show in a tense confrontation last week he ordered union business agent Roberts or a caller to have them

return to work. Oh are you going to tell these people back to work. And direct that you answer the question sir. Were you. Here. Today under the threat that individual judicial workers would be arrested and prosecuted. And changed his mind that it is most damaging to me personally that I just need to know that. I will tell you that it is only that I will tell you. Despite the fact that judicial employees are returning to work they say they are still committed to the strike and are going to picket in their spare time. These people are so angry and so hungry they're going to be out there at night so you're going to be out there in the morning they are not going to let us down. This strike is going to continue. We

are going to have. The union is asking for a 60 percent raise over two years. They claim they're paid an average of $3000 a year less than workers doing the same thing in other counties. The county calls a union request outrageous and is offering a 25 percent raise over two years. Still they say there is room for movement. We have never taken the position that we were going to war the two sides will get together with a mediator tomorrow morning for the first time since before the strike started last Wednesday night. But one union official told us the sides are so far apart. He doesn't think mediation will change anything in Atlantic County. Dan Hobson and elsewhere on the labor front the strike by Garden State Parkway toll collectors and maintenance workers continues tonight wages and benefits. The main problems there but talks are scheduled to pick up tomorrow and that strike 30000 state workers represented by the Communication Workers of America still don't have a contract. Talks are continuing with the state and one union spokesman told us

today those talks are going smoothly. But if that doesn't continue union already has authorization from its rank and file for a strike. The US Senate Ethics Committee will begin looking into the conduct of a Senate colleague Harrison Williams beginning tomorrow. The senior senator from New Jersey has been convicted on Abscam corruption charges and has refused to resign so under King reports on the hearing. The hearings could lead to the expulsion of Pete Williams after 23 years in the Senate. The 61 year old Democrat still insists he is innocent of any wrongdoing and despite pressure to quietly resign and spare the public agony of these hearings. Williams says he has nothing to hide and nothing to fear. The last time that the senator's Abscam behavior came under scrutiny the scene was Brooklyn federal court. And after five weeks of trial scores of witnesses and reels of incriminating tapes the jury said guilty guilty on all counts of bribery conspiracy and abuse of his high office. But even when that. Conviction came in after three long days

of waiting. Pete Williams said he would fight for his Senate seat that he would not resign and three months later he continues to insist he will not step down. But this time the jury will be his own peers. Six fellow senators three Republicans three Democrats. Their job to recommend ultimate action to the full body of the Senate and they will not be bound by a simple no or yes guilty or not open to them on a wide range of options from no penalty to censure to expulsion. And despite House action against its members convicted in Abscam there's been no Senate president in decades. No committee members would talk to us today. A staffer saying only that they're anxious not to make these hearings a media event. But the committee is expected to consider whether Pete Williams did violate its rules of conflict disclosure and improper behavior which may reflect upon the Senate. The senator wasn't talking either but his aides say he still hopes for vindication on all of those counts. He also hopes his colleagues will see Abscam as a threat to their rights

and autonomy and that they will see him as a foolish but innocent Abscam victim in Washington. I'm Sandra King. A federal judge in Newark did an about face today and ruled the Justice Department cannot claim one million dollars in water pollution damage from owners of the Qin block landfill. Judge Clarkson S. Fisher had ruled in April that the federal government could seek the million is common law damages. He was forced to reverse himself in the US Supreme Court ruled against that concept in two different cases. The owners of can book had asked the judge to reconsider his ruling following the Supreme Court decisions. The judge did but says he still doesn't think he was wrong. It's just that the Supreme Court has told him he's wrong. Residents of Western Morris County are asking the state to close the comb landfill which they say is threatening their water supply with toxic chemicals. Tom Stewart reports. Who do you go to in there and say what do we do. The state doesn't seem to get that day.

More than 200 Chester residents are pressuring the State Department of Environmental Protection to shut down the 250 industrial solvents were dumped for 25 years until 1975. Ultimately would like to close the landfill and make sure it is properly secured to prevent the leak from contaminating our wells has already started. But we want to try and stop it 100 of the dumps neighbors dug into their own pockets to pay for water samples. They claim toxic chemicals turned up in 42 of their residential wells as a result many are taking the advice of State and Federal environmental officials and using bottled water so much the way. We get water from our sun. There isn't a town near here. Call me Representatives acknowledge the testing ground water contamination at the dump. So he's been working with the Department of Environmental Protection and sampling. The wells that we have on site inside the landfill and we're going to compile and try and determine exactly the extent of this

contamination. Chester City officials fear the toxic plume could spread beyond the landfill to nearby wetlands that serve as the Raritan Rivers head waters. We have to make sure that the water that comes to our town is pure. Because if we don't think that we let go here eventually finds itself going to the breakfast table the millions of people from New Jersey. But officials have yet to conclusively establish a link between the landfill and the contaminated wells. So townspeople promised to do just that at a special public meeting with Health and Environmental officials July 28 in Chester Township Morris County. I'm Tom steward. New Jerseyans may feel like they're on an energy bill rollercoaster these days the Elizabethtown gas company has asked for a twelve point eight million dollar rate reduction. But Public Service Electric and Gas wants higher rates. Elizabeth found gas as it's asking for the rate reduction because a recent court decision eliminated a Louisiana pipeline tax and that the company's gas costs it could mean a savings of $10 this winter for each customer.

Those asking for one hundred seventy nine million dollars in higher natural gas rates because it says costs have gone up as a result of decontrol. An appellate division decision could mean a windfall for the 600000 motorists in this state covered by Allstate insurance. The court ruled today that Allstate cannot keep the 22 million dollars it got from a rate hike imposed over a year ago. The decision could mean an average rebate of thirty seven dollars per policy holder. Allstate is New Jersey's largest auto insurer. Medical history was made at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Camden recently. A 32 year old woman gave birth to a healthy baby who had grown outside her womb for the entire pregnancy. Susan Moss reports. Meet Linda when her week old baby actually a healthy 7 pounds 14 ounces. They look pretty much like your average new mother and child except for the fact Linda has a low grade infection and can't hold breath for a few days. But according to doctors here at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital this pair is a medical miracle.

In a normal pregnancy the fetus grows here inside the woman's uterus commonly called the womb. In Linda's case here in the abdominal cavity outside the uterus and stayed here for the entire nine months carrying the baby. A full term abdominal pregnancy with a baby is born without any congenital defects occur out of 200000 such cases. Doctors think Linda's fallopian tube of ruptured causing the fertilized egg to re-employ in the abdominal wall. Still the fetus had no trouble surviving normally speaking with a pregnancy occurring within the after birth that the fetus is attached to the inner lining of the womb. In this case and the afterbirth was attached to the inner abdominal structures the inner lining of the abdominal wall and develops from nourishment from those features to the operating table.

Even the ultrasound testing had been done when his life was in danger throughout her three hours of delivery to liver and she was fine. They were concerned with me because I was losing a lot of blood. And as a matter of fact I thought they were going to lose me. They had to completely replace all of my blood. And then they put me in intensive care for three days. Being 32 years old and has decided not to tempt fate. And since this is her second trial she had her uterus removed after giving birth to Brooke. Asked what she thinks about having accomplished the nearly impossible Linda refused to take much credit. I don't feel special I just feel so. God smiled on me. In Camden I'm Susan nice loss. Governor burn today put his signature on a bill authorizing construction of a new state prison the exact side of the medium security prison is still to be determined. Burns as a facility will probably be built in the northern section of Camden but Camden Mayor Melvin Primus says a spot of mine in the city's downtown area both sides will have to get together on the location but the cost has been set.

Thirty million dollars for the 400 bed prison thirty two state prisoners will get a new address this week a Sussex County Jail in Newton. They're being moved to alleviate overcrowding in state prisons. The first 16 will arrive in Newton this Friday the second group on July 30 first. Sussex County officials didn't want the prisoners but Governor Byrne issued an emergency order that they take them to their jail has 86 cells but only 36 county inmates Sussex County does get something out of the deal training for 10 new guards and $32 per day for each prisoner of houses. When Camden firemen arrived at a huge fire in that city's industrial area this morning they found the fire hydrants open. Complicating their efforts to control the fire the blaze burned for four hours and went to seven alarms. 150 firemen had to be called in five of them had to be treated at local hospitals for minor injuries. The fire started in the h n m power company building on Pine Street spread to the adjacent national heating and building supply company and two other nearby buildings. Once the fire was put out investigators began immediately to look for its call. At Latics city's air has been dangerously unhealthy all summer according to an air pollution

monitoring group. Ozone levels in Atlantic City exceeded federal health limits seven times and approach them another four times according to the Delaware Valley Citizens Council for clean air Atlanta. City has had the worst air pollution in the Delaware Valley for 17 of the last thirty seven days. Now here's a look at the weather forecast tonight will be warm but with less humidity than today the temperatures will be in the low to the mid 70s. Tomorrow will be sunny and warm with decreasing humidity the highs will be in the upper 80s to the 90s. And the outlook for Wednesday sunny and pleasant. Time for tonight's closer look at Newark Here's Gus heading Burke.

Late last year a coalition of private corporations announced the formation of renaissance a new project aimed at revitalizing downtown New York. It's been more than six months now since that initial announcement. What has been accomplished so far. John Maddox is executive director of renaissance in New York and is here with us today. John in that six month period give us a progress report. Well I'm very optimistic let me say that at the point we're at now I think we have I think we have played a very meaningful role in a number of the projects that were underway before the creation of the corporation and possibly they being the reason for the creation of the corporation. I think we've in addition to of course staffing offices and becoming involved as a coordinator and a facilitator of projects. I think with what I think with I think we've taken a good clean crisp look at the downtown business district from up from a private sector investment development

perspective I think have you have you made a judgment you in the private sector people made a judgment that Newark is a viable investment possibility at this point. Oh that apps absolutely so absolutely So I think that the projects that are underway now and truly underway now demonstrate demonstrate that. But beyond that the potential is there. Down the road. Well let's talk about the ones which are well underway now there is a the Washington Park building really started before Renaissance and the whole issue of the status of that. Well they're clearing ground now to start their start they have started construction they're clearing buildings on the site now for the construction of 400000 square foot office building and the laser dot a major tenet will be a Bell Telephone as after that major tenant at this point probably 70 percent of the building will be Bell Telephone. But significant at least from my perspective it puts first class office space on the market available and on the market uptown.

Now John we've read or heard about other buildings which are in various stages of discussion and negotiation. What are they. Well of course you will I know are familiar with Prudential's expansion of the gateway complex they have four point eight acres under under option. They have got their building designed and cost it out. We expect to hear within a week from hard on the approval of roughly 10 million dollar you Dagg that would assist them in the construction of the parking parking garage and pedestrian walkway. Very optimistic that's a 65 million dollar 500000 square foot office building all of which Prudential will take possibly 50 to 60 percent of. But again it puts some first class office space on the market downtown which is desperately needed. When you say they will take 50 to 60 for their own employees and whether it's for their own UIC Yes or their own use. Some problems have cropped up. There is speculation that the increase in the mass transit

fares may cause a dramatic decrease in the use of mass transit. How will that impact if at all. Well one of the major assets of downtown Newark of course is its accessibility by public transportation to railroads in the hub of the bus. The buses in the region. It will have an impact we want the degree of that impact will be I think is going to be a function of how high the fares go. I simply do not believe that that we in Newark or in the northeast are going to abandon in place mass transportation systems. It is the degree of impact is going to be a function I think of society in general and then what they are willing to pay to for that convenience is one of the unique characteristics of Renaissance Newark is going to add other projects John has been a public sector private sector joint effort here in the city of Newark has has some very specific minority participation requirements for contractors and workers. There has

been some conflict about that. What is the present status of that problem. I'm familiar with the city ordinances that require a minority contractor participation in projects that receive local property tax abatement. I would hope and I would hope that the construction projects that are about to take place obviously will comply with with the law because I think they should I think that's one of our purposes is to is to employ people. I know there have been there has been controversy in the past on major construction projects. I would only hope that the individuals the developers in the financial institutions involved in these upcoming projects address that problem recognized that it's a problem and address it and resolve it before it becomes before it becomes a problem that can inhibit future development because that it can do that if it becomes a serious problem.

One final quick question John. What will be the first building to actually dig a hole and start coming up out of the ground. Well I would say at this point you'd probably be Turner constructions building at one Washington Park an entrepreneurial developer has options land just set just south of the Gateway project so that sites like the construction company is a very very active construction. OK John Maddox executive director of Renaissance no up with a progress report. Thanks for joining us and thank you Gus We'll be right back with Bill Perry the good news the bad news in sports. And here's Bill with a cosmos and swimming and track and a whole lot more bill and a whole lot more thank you than the

cosmos are not playing in the NASL of this week they're defending a trans-Atlantic Cup championship and last night the defense began with a game against Glasgow Celtic the Scottish team the team that replaced the Soviet Union after the Russians pulled out of the round robin tournament the Kosmos wanted to do nothing before twenty nine thousand at Giants Stadium 14 minutes into the match Steve Wereley de France Rob and the rest of bogey and the goal for Julio Cesar Romero left footed 1 nothing kosmos. The Scottish team had some scoring chances but Hubert Burke and Myra made quite a few nice saves here is one of them. And the clincher for the Cosmos off the corner kick from bogey 25 minutes into the second half it goes in off Jeff Durgin shoulder two to nothing this Wednesday night. The Cosmos host Southampton of England and this past Saturday night the NASL Seattle Sounders beat Southampton three to one. There was more international competition over the weekend it was the United States against the Soviet Union and a two day track and field competition in Leningrad the Soviets won the competition. Two hundred fourteen one hundred seventy eight but willing Rose Michelle Glover was a double winner taking the 100 meter dash and

then in the women's 4 by 100 meter relay the high standout anchored the final leg taking the handoff and starting out a 4 yard disadvantage but by virtue of this furious finish and a well timed lean at the Tate Glover snatched what looked like an easy win for the Soviets here is one more look at that spectacular finish. Michelle Glover. Closer to home last week was a racquetball week in New Jersey on the state's 1981 racquetball championships concluded yesterday after three days of competition it all took place at the King George racquet club in Green Brook and 23 division championships were decided in the Men's Open competition right capital Quantock was a winner for Chester New York when Captain always started playing he didn't think it would lead to any state title. I graduated college and I was out there playing football. I never thought I'd be this good or racquetball player. But fortunately I turned out. In men's doubles it was just in New York and North

Plainfield in the Women's Open division Kathy yards the champion women senior division. Lori come in. How would you like to swim twenty three and a half miles while there was a marathon swim today. The around the island swim off AB seek an island it was a 23 and a half mile swim an experience paid off for last year's champion Paul asked myth of trip Hugo Canyon California Paul jump in the water swim for a son as Myth 1 it going away. There wasn't another swimmer in sight. That's true there are no swimmers in sight as tall as myth. Cross the finish line with a time of eight hours 49 minutes and 30 seconds at one point today as Mitt had a two and a half mile 40 minute lead over the field no video. Paul asked me around the island swim does that mean we have video for our next story folks sailing OK. Beautiful weekend for sailing Mike Marino of Perth Amboy took advantage. He won the thirty fifth annual Red Grant regatta the Raritan yacht club sponsor of the invitational. Our Krista Gasper US has more real to you right now Trish.

It's one of the most prestigious sailing events on the East Coast. Named after Grant Park damn boy sailor who was killed at sea in World War 2. It's been going on for 35 years and has remained popular while many other regattas have come and gone. One hundred and seven boats from 16 feet to 50 feet and five different classes competed and while the sailors look relaxed. There's really a lot of work and strategy and competition. Arthur is a sailor for 50 years. Told me about it. Oh it's a it's a tricky thing like any sport. You got to know what you're doing. You got to be able to handle your boat correctly. Got to figure out where the wind is coming from and take advantage of everything and try to come in first each time. I'm trying to guess breasts.

Thank you Trish. With just swam in through the door Paul come on. That's OK for the story. Thanks a lot Bill. Once again our top stories New Yorkers facing another water crisis tonight as workmen rush to repair that pipeline destroyed by vandalism last week an older section of pipe began to leak flooding. Local roads and that's the news for Bill Perry I'm Don Torrance Good night from everyone here at New Jersey. New Jersey not here. This is a presentation of New Jersey Public Television.

13 The program is broadcast on weeknights at 6:30 p.m. on Channel 13 and at 7:30 p.m. The New Jersey public television there is a repeat broadcast at 10:00 p.m. the New Jersey public television and it's 7:00 befall the morning on Channel 13. Motion is reported. The director of the Essex County Parks Recreation and Cultural Affairs Department. When is the last time you took a walk. Have you tossed a Frisbee lately or visited a zoo. Wifey and it is an international program that advocates one basic thing. Don't watch life go by. Get out and participate in it. Through the cooperation of the National Recreation and Parks Association the Essex County Department of Parks Recreation and cultural fairs and the New Jersey Recreation and Parks Association are promoting life beyond it program and we hope you will become part of it.

Essex county's park system is the oldest in the country and we've got the facilities and programs you need to increase your participation in life whether you take advantage of our skating programs at our arenas in West Orange in New York or prefer to enjoy one of the many free concerts in our parks. We hope you'll pick an activity that gets you excited about being alive. Wherever you live there's probably a park you pass every day. Don't just drive by it stop and use it. Be watching for the life be in it. Promotional announcements on your local TV channels. And remember whether you participate in an organized activity or just walk the dog. The important thing is you get out and do something. It's your life. Be an it. Public forum welcomes opposing viewpoints. Right. New Jersey Public Television 15 73 Parkside at.