Due to high demand and a large number of interested stakeholders, the, EMP Committee will host two additional public stakeholder meetings on September 3 and 5, 2019. These hearings will supplement the previously scheduled public stakeholder meetings on the Draft 2019 EMP which were held on July 17 in Trenton and August 8 in Newark. The September 3 meeting will be held in Hackensack and the September 5 meeting will be held in Toms River.

“We called on the BPU to have more EMP hearings and now they did. It’s good that they are listening. The New Jersey Sierra Club along with 30 other environmental groups sent a letter to the board asking for three hearings, one in Bergen County, one in Ocean County, and another near the PennEast Pipeline. We thank the BPU for holding two more hearings in Hackensack and Toms River. This is especially important because these areas have been impacted by fossil fuel projects and there are several new proposed down the pipe,” said Jeff Tittel, Director of the New Jersey Sierra Club. “Now that BPU are having more hearings, they have to listen to the public who want to get rid of carbon neutral language and those who call for a moratorium on new fossil fuel power plants and pipelines.”

The remaining stakeholder meetings are scheduled as follows:

***Stakeholder Meeting 5 (newly added)***

Date:                 Tuesday, September 3

Time:                 6 PM – 8 PM

Location:            Hackensack Administration Building, Freeholder’s Public Meeting Room, 5th floor, 1 Bergen County Plaza, Hackensack, NJ

***Stakeholder Meeting 6 (newly added)***

Date:                 Thursday, September 5

Time:                 6 PM – 8 PM

Location:            LMH Room, Toms River Municipal Complex, 33 Washington Street, Toms River, NJ

Stakeholder Meetings 7 & 8

Date:                  Thursday, September 12

Times:                1 PM – 4 PM / 4:30 PM – 7:30 PM

Location:            Black Box Theater, The Kroc Center, 1865 Harrison Ave, Camden, NJ 08105

“Now that BPU have provided additional EMP hearings, it is critical for the public to come out. They need to speak up that they don’t want a fossil fuel power plant in the Meadowland and they don’t want a disastrous SRL pipeline in the Pinelands! The public needs to voice their support for 100% renewable energy and zero carbon future. Bergen and Ocean County are on the verge of being infiltrated by fossil fuel power plants and pipelines. We now have a better opportunity to demonstrate to the BPU that we need to put a moratorium on new fossil fuel projects so that we can protect our clean air, our clean water, and move forward with greener energy for New Jersey. Our climate and our environment depend on it,” said Jeff Tittel, Director of the New Jersey Sierra Club.

Stakeholders can register to speak at these public meetings (please refresh your browser cache when visiting the website). Additionally all stakeholders are encouraged to submit written comments. The EMP Committee will accept written comments until noon on Monday, September 16, 2019 atemp.comments@bpu.nj.gov.