The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1891-08-21

aud Water Board of Newark entered
Clerk Runyon's office just as did and
] asked him.
How do you find Passaic water in
Newark
.'Horriblel never knew it to be so
bad, and what makes It worse for US Is
that the demand for It for motive power
IS so great that we are forced to pump
direct to the water mains and cannot
draw from the reservoir. II the water
could stand In the reservoir some of the
filth would settle. We are pumping a.
100000 gallons of water day"
rs there any bad smell from the
waterf'
"Smelli It stinks. 1t is unfit for use.
but thank the Lord we will have good
supply OF wholesome water about Janu-
AIRY from the new aqueduct."
Yes" said Chief Clerk Runyon, in re-
plT to my question, "the water is very,
very bad. receive daily many commun-
ications from our citizens complaining OF
the condition OF the water. Isuppose the
water In Jersey City is just as bad IL not
worse. 1t is simply question of time
when your city must change Its water
supply, for the Passaic sewers will force
it to do SO. The refuse from that city is
awful. We try to keep the pipes and
dead ends" as clean as possible by blow
ing of the hydrants and putting in new
pipes, but the relief obtained In this way
is neither great nor permanent. The
water was SO bad in my house that It
could not be used to batne In. had the
hydrant blown of and the water became
clearer. but the stencil WAS the same"
''Is there much vegetation along the
Passaic this yearP
There has never been such growth of
vegetation along the river that can be re-
membered Of. aud naturally when this
matter decomposes It poliutes the water"
N mi At N ad n a r
bage In Passaic Brook has anything
been done TO remedy the matter 7"
"Yes | wrote to the authorities at
East Orange to clean it, but my COM
munication had no effect"
A BURNING QUESTION.
"Say," said Mr.. Runyon, why Is 1t
that it costs Jersey City twice as much
for coal as it does Newark? / under
stand you burn twice as much at Belle
vile as we do. Our water works, you
know, are about three-fourths of a mile
north of Belleville.H
Ireplied that did not know why 50
much coal was used, and thanking him
for the courteous attention he had shown
so different from our own Chief Clerk
of the Street and Water Board-I said
goodbye.
i next saw w. e. Greyhead, ex-Secre-
tary of the defunct Joint Board of Pol
luton of Essex and Hudson counties. He
ment of Newark. He said that COM
plants about the water were made to
him daily. AL complained of its filthy
appearance and bad odor. The only re-
lief the city could give was TO keep cou.
stantly blowing off the hydrants. which
made 1t little cleaner.
"The water is SO FOUL" he said, sit
kills the grass If sprinkled on daily"
Clerk Rose. who receives the water
rents for Newark, said nearly every citi-
zen complained to him of the water
when he paid his water taxes. They
were unanimous In declaring Passaic
water to be unwholesome, filthy and to
have bad smell.
sought Corporation Counsel Price of
Newark and asked him IL he knew Pas
sale City had several sewers draining
into Passaic River.
BLESS you, Of course do" he replied.
"Passaic City has been doing this for
some time. Ii has a complete system of
sewerage. Some of it is finished and
some under construction and nearly COM
pleted."
"Well, Colonel, how aboBt the suit to
prevent this emptying of Passaic sewers
into the river. brought by Hudson aud
Essex counties against Passaic City"
I'VE are pushing it as fast as possible.
We are now printing the testimony for
the Court. There are seventy pages of
It, and we print about ten Dages a day.
We will have one more days examina-
ton and then our case will be closed.
That will not delay the printers any. AS
soon as we can present the testimony to
the Court we will make formal applica-
tion to it for preliminary injunction and
continue the fight"