News from Skylands CLEAN, Inc.

Out in cold on sinkhole resolution
Letters to the editor -- Bergen Record, November 30, 2008

We were glad to see "On the edge" (Editorial, Nov. 24) on the sinkholes in Upper Ringwood. They have affected our lives for several years. Our lives have been on hold while officials decide our families’ fates.

The borough has not made us any formal offers; officials have not even included us in the process that will ultimately decide whether we will return to our homes. Their only concern is borough finances, not our welfare.

The borough says it is offering to pay off our mortgages. But that doesn’t give us back our home or the equity we’ve built up over the years. They’ll give us at best a small amount: $15,000 to $20,000. Needless to say, we can’t buy anything for that amount of money.

Borough Manager Kelley Rohde was on News 12 saying that the borough will partly fix Roger DeGroat’s sinkhole, then subdivide his property so he doesn’t own the part with the hazard. All this does is move the problem "next door." It doesn’t make his family or his neighbors any safer.

And it’s troubling that she discussed these plans on TV. Maybe once the borough is done selling this plan to taxpayers and the press, it will ask us our opinion.

All we want is what was taken from us, nothing more and nothing less.

Roger DeGroat

Ringwood, Nov. 24

Jeanine Mann

Riverdale, Nov. 24