The Central New Jersey Home News from New Brunswick, New Jersey • 17

EDITORIALS LIFESTYLE OBITUARIES THURSDAY, DECEMBER 27. 1984 i ill ii nrfi Wdckaway lahdfill 1 site contains planned park BPU last week. TRENTON (AP) A site in Rockaway Township approved by the state Department of Environmental Protection for a landfill contains a 900-acre plot of land the agency will buy to develop into a park, officials said yesterday. Z. Rep.

James J. Florio, D-lst said the DEP had shown the "height of ironic, bureaucratic idiocy" by deciding to develop park land within the same area targeted for a landfill. ''They can't site the landfill there," said Florio, who toured the proposed landfill site yesterday at the request of Rockaway Township officials. Florio said the landfill never could be es- for a landfill two years ago, the House Transportation and Tourism Subcommittee, which be beads, held hearings in Rockaway Township and determined the location was unacceptable for a landfill. Florio said Kean wrote to local officials shortly after the bearing and announced the state had withdrawn the location from consideration as a landfill.

On Monday, Kean signed legislation to spend money from the Green Acres Bond Act of 1983 to purchase 900 acres in the Mount Hope Lake tract, situated in the Rockaway River Watershed and adjacent to the Picatinny Arsenal Green Acres bond money is administered by the DEP. James Staples, a DEP spokesman, said it appeared that the proposed landfill would be located near the park project and the lake. About 900 acres of the site selected by Morris County officials was usable as a landfill. But Staples disagreed with Florio over whether the dump and the park could sit side-by-side. "There is room for the lake to co-exist with the landfill," Staples said.

Morris County also has an agreement with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People to permit moderate-and low-income housing to be built on the landfill site in order to comply with the state Supreme Court's Mount Laurel decision. tablished within the site because it contains a sole-source aquifer, or underground reservoir. The site was selected by the Morris County Board of Freeholders for a 200-acre dump after a Superior Court judge shut Hamm's Sanitary Landfill in Lafayette Township, Sussex County. Hamm's, the county's prime landfill, was closed because it had reached maximum capacity and posed an environmental threat Twenty Morris County communities affected by the closing of Hamm's now are dumping at the Edgeboro Disposal Inc. landfill in East Brunswick under an emergency redirection order issued by the DEP and Under an agreement proposed by Morris and Middlesex counties, the Morris communities would have dumped at Edgeboro until Dec.

1, by which Morris was to open a new dump within its boundaries. After district and appellate judges refused to sign the agreement, the DEP and BPU issued the emergency order, which w'll expire Jan. 10. Florio said the dump proposed for Rockaway Township could violate federal laws and that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency would reject any request to locate a dump site over a sole-source aquifer.

Florio said when the administration of Gov. Thomas H. Kean selected the same site Heist prober pursue DEP to appeal route of radioactive waste every possible lead' 4X J' 7 out" in considering possible suspects. Investigators would be talking to current and former employees of the armored car company, as well as people involved in some of the businesses that engage the the company's services, he said. "We are reaching out for everyone who has any knowledge of the company or the premises," Rockoff said.

"That will take us wherever we have to geographically. It's (the investigation) spread beyond the county. That's why the FBI is so helpful." Rockoff said authorities believe at least two people were involved in the theft because of the amount of labor necessary to drill a hole through the foot-thick vault wall. The last employee left the premises at 7:30 p.m. Sunday after turning on the three-alarm systems, Rockoff said.

Another employee, described as a dispatcher, returned at 4:25 a.m. Monday, according to Rockoff. "He opened the front door and noticed the alarm system had been turned off," Rockoff said. "He looked and found the vault door was opened and there was a gaping bole in the vault wait" Rockoff said he believed the burglars entered the building through a window. On the way out, one burglar apparently dragged the bags of money to a window and dropped them to another person standing near a vehicle.

The three-alarm systems, linked to the Perth Amboy police department did not go off throughout the night authorities said. Rockoff said the night watchman who patrols Deputy Attorney General Lawrence Stanley also argued the state had the power to change what roads the estimated 32 shipments would travel within the state borders and at what point they could enter New Jersey because of a state statute prohibiting the transport of radioactive material through highly populated areas. The state proposed an alternate route, under which trucks would have entered the state via Route 276 in Burlington County and traveled to Lacey Township on 1-95, routes 537 and 571, the Garden State Parkway and Route 9. Jersey Central Power Light argued that New Jersey cannot reject a route approved by a federal agency and that changing the route would make it necessary to take the radioactive material near populous areas of Pennsylvania, including Philadelphia and Harrisburg. In agreeing with Bissell said allowing one state to unilaterally change the route would "promote bickering, confusion" and legal battles between bordering states.

Earlier this year, Bissell struck down a Lacey Township ordinance that prevented nuclear waste from being stored in the municipality. Oyster Creek sent the nuclear fuel assemblies to the plant in upstate New York in 1975. A federal judge in Buffalo last year ordered the facility closed and the waste removed. NEWARK (AP) The sUte Department of Environmental Protection will appeal a federal court decision allowing Jersey Central Power St Light Co. to transport radioactive fuel rods through highly populated sections of New Jersey, including Middlesex County, a department official said yesterday.

Steven Kuhrtz, director of the agency's Division of Environmental Quality, said the appeal would be filed sometime in early January in the U.S. Court of Appeals. On Monday, U.S. District Judge John Bissell ruled in Newark that the state could not veto a planned transport route that had been approved by the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Bissell said the utility company was free to begin shipping the 224 spent nuclear fuel rods on flatbed trucks from a West Valley, N.Y., storage facility to the Oyster Creek nuclear reactor in Lacey Township.

The route calls for trucks to enter New Jersey through the Delaware Water Gap on Route 80, follow Route 287 to the New Jersey Turnpike and 1-95, then exit onto Route 9 for the final journey to the reactor site. The DEP argued the route might be unsafe because of construction scheduled to begin in the spring on a five-mile stretch of Route 287 from Bridgewater to Piscataway. in By BARBARA S. GREENE Home News staff NEW BRUNSWICK Investigators from the FBI, the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office and the Perth Amboy Police Department are pursuing "every possible lead" In the multimillion-dollar theft at the York Armored Car and Courier but have no suspects so far, according to Prosecutor Alan A. Rockoff.

The heist, believed to be the work of at least two burglars, reportedly occurred late Sunday or early Monday. The thieves bypassed two alarm systems and a sonic detector, then cut a hole in a vault at the business, located at 1160 State St, Perth Amboy. Authorities believe between $3 million and $4 million may have been stolen. As of late yesterday afternoon, investigators still were trying to determine the exact amount Rockoff said. At the time of the theft, the vault held up to $5 million in cash and checks, its largest total all year, Rockoff said.

The money, most of it from area merchants and deposited in small denominations, will be difficult to trace, the prosecutor said. An FBI spokesman said 50 agents have been assigned to the case. He said there were "no new leads" in the case. Rockoff would not comment on whether the money was stolen by people familiar with the layout of the two-story brick building and the location of its three alarm systems. He said investigators were "ruling nothing A WINTER SANDMAN Inir ii "in ALAN A.

ROCKOFF no suspects the industrial complex did not report anything unusual. He declined to comment on possible evidence found at the scene. An unidentified man who answered the phone yesterday at York referred reporters' calls to the authorities and declined to answer any questions. Associated Press reports were incorporated into this story. St ft Stephen ville tract rezoned in Edison I if I By JOHN T.WARD Home News staff EDISON A controversial 1.1-acre tract of land off Park Avenue is once again zoned for residential use following action by the Township Council last night.

But developer Leonard Sendelsky, armed with approvals gained last month from the Planning Board, vowed to move ahead with bis plans to build a retail and office project on the corner of Richard Road and Stephenville Parkway. Under state law, Sendelsky's approvals are unaffected by any zone changes for two years, said Gordon Berkow, the developer's attorney. Over the objections of two council-men and the township's attorneys, the council amended the zoning of the vacant parcel from local business to single-family residential. The action was required, supporters argued, to correct what they termed an error on a 1972 zoning map that was perpetuated as law in the 1978 land-use code. Before the vote, Sendelsky's attorney, Gordon Berkow, told the council a decision to rezone the land would be "a perversion of the zoning process" that would serve only to create a non-conforming use of the planned building.

Dozens of area residents, many of them bearing signs that read "Boycott Stephenville Stores," urged the council to preserve the character and safety of the neighborhood. Referring to the signs, Councilman George Spadoro said "even if Sendelsky wins this battle, he's going to lose the war," because residents have vowed to picket the operation. Councilmen Sidney Frankel and John Hogan opposed the rezoning. They said the case would be challenged in court and the township would lose an assessment endorsed by the council's legal advisers. But a number of residents endorsed the notion of the township defending the rezoning in court, if necessary.

Speaking in favor of the change, Councilman Angelo Orlando, who also sits on the Planning Board, said it is the responsibility of officials to uphold the rights of the people in such matters. Sendelsky said he will move shortly to get building permits for the project. Township officials would not speculate whether they could prevent him from obtaining the permits. ft. AP Photo Noah and Gabs Phillips, ages 6 and 8, build a Florida-style temperatures are reported to be unseasonably warm, reaching snowman yesterday at Lake Falrvlew In Orlando, where up Into the 80s.

Hillsborough cops' Christmas includes communications rig Old Bridge PBA OKs two-year salary pact By EVELYN APGAR Ar prevent radio transmissions," Laskowski said. If the police had had the communications equipment last year, Patrolman Arnold Hodgson might not have been shot while arresting a driver in a stolen car, Mayor Joseph Sullivan said last night. Hodgson, whose bulletproof vest protected him from injury, was unable to communicate with headquarters before checking the vehicle, as is the department's practice. "And if we had the computer terminal, he could have checked (with a nationwide crime statistics information system) to see if the car was stolen," Sullivan said. The pricetag for the communications equipment was $62,000.

The terminal will cost the township $11,000. Republican Committeemen Jerry Palmiotti and Michael Merdinger had sought to purchase three $10,000 police cars and to eliminate the other items. The Democrats Sullivan, Pat Mondello and Stephanie Gallagher-Feist prevailed with a proposal to buy two police cars and equipment for the rescue squad. By KATHLEEN DZIELAK Home News staff T6lD BRIDGE Patrolman's Be-' Inevolent Association Local 127 has rjratUied a two-year contract that I provides for a 6 percent retroactive pay increase in 1984 and an 8 per-Zcent Increase in 1985. About 75 percent of the PBA's 91 members last week voted in favor of ratification, according to PBA Presi-; dent Bob Bonfante.

He said retroactive paychecks have been distributed to association members, who had been working without a contract since last of a tentative tract settlement had been delayed nearly three months because of a problem with the contract's wording. The dispute Involved overtime pay for detectives, who previously were paid straight time for any hours worked beyond their regular shifts, Bonfante said. Under the new contract detectives will be paid time-and-a-half for working beyond their regular shifts, except when they are working on continuing investigations, Bonfante said. The PBA contract establishes the following 1985 salaries for members of the police department first-year patrolman, second-year patrolman, third-year patrolman, fourth-year patrolman, and fifth-year patrolman, $29,358. Home News correspondent HILLSBOROUGH Christmas happened twice for the township's police department this year, and with it came a communications rig, two police cars and a computer terminal that had been on the department's wish list for several years.

The police equipment was among capital items that the Township Committee last night agreed to purchase with a 1984 budget surplus of $125,300. "It's the best news I've heard in a long time. They're things we really need," said Sgt. Thomas Laskowski, the of ficer in charge last night. Police Chief Donald Dowches, who was unavailable for comment last night, had requested the new communications system to replace a system put together piecemeal over the past 20 years.

In some parts of the township, officers on patrol must relay messages through the Somerset County Sher-. iff's Communication System, according to Laskowski. "We have dead spots in the Sourland Mountains that BOB BONFANTE PBA president.