Resident at end of rope with officials and bugs
Arlene Greenway
Guest Column

I am a resident of Jackson for 20 years. I have paid extremely high taxes while living here. This year Mayor Mark Seda put me and my family (as a resident and a homeowner) in a position that I did not want to be in.

Although the mayor was advised by the state Depart-ment of Agriculture to spray for gypsy moths, he chose not to listen to them and made the decision not to spray. As a result of his decision, my home and property were infested with gypsy moth caterpillars. The mayor never gave us (the residents) any type of warning that he made the decision not to spray and left us to deal with the infestation and devastation caused by these caterpillars.

For the past four weeks, many residents have been infested with gypsy moth caterpillars, which has caused major devastation to our homes and properties and ruined our lifestyle. Our homes, cars and everything in our yards were covered in caterpillar feces. This condition had to be unsanitary. Our properties were ruined and many 50-foot-tall oak trees as well as our landscaping trees were destroyed. Evergreens on my property were eaten by the caterpillars also.

I made several calls to Mayor Seda for help; he did not return my phone calls. I finally contacted News 12 New Jersey, which came to my home and then aired the story. The following day Mayor Seda decided to return my phone call. He told me he saw my house on the news the night before. When I asked him for any type of help, he told me there is nothing he can do to help me and said "my hands are tied." I asked him tied with what? He repeatedly told me there is nothing he can do for me.

When Mayor Seda was unable to help me, I contacted a few council members. They gave me the same answer. I thought the mayor and council members are in office for the people. I thought they were supposed to and would want to help the residents of Jackson. I was wrong.

We tried to do our best to handle this situation but it was greater than you could imagine. It came to the point in which we were so infested that we had to hire a private exterminator to spray heavy doses of insecticide on our property, at a cost of hundreds of dollars, to destroy the insects. The exterminator said it was the worst infestation he had ever seen.

Once again I was put in a position I did not want to be in. We had the choice of living with the infestation or spraying high doses of insecticide on our property. Because the exterminator said the infestation was so bad and that the caterpillars could get inside our home, we made the decision to spray. As a mother of four children I did not want to spray these insecticides on my property, but I was left with no choice. Are there going to be health issues later on in life as a result of the insecticide being sprayed on my property?

We then had to hire a power washing company for the cleanup of thousands of dead caterpillars, their feces and blood stains at a cost of $350. We pay extremely high taxes in Jackson and it is unthinkable that I would be expected to pay these costs incurred to exterminate and to remove caterpillars that I did not put on my property. I want to be reimbursed. Because many residents in Jackson had this infestation problem, it was not an individual homeowner problem. It is a township problem. And the township is ignoring it.

As a precaution for next year's batch of gypsy moths, I am faced with the decision to cut down the trees on my property that are either dead or will be infested again next year. This cost to me would be thousands of dollars. The township has an ordinance that for every tree I cut down as a homeowner, I must replace with another tree. What would be the logic of this? This would be a never-ending cycle of cutting down trees, replacing trees, gypsy moth infestation and repeating the entire process every year. This makes no sense to me and I do not have enough money to do this.

I have made numerous calls to the mayor, Township Council members, Ocean County Freeholders, state Sen. Robert Singer and state Assemblyman Joseph Malone, and have also contacted Congressman Chris Smith's office and Gov. Jon Corzine, the New Jersey Department of Agriculture, the New Jersey Health Department and a master gardener.

None of the above have been able to or are willing to help us right now. We need their help now! The only help I received was from a staff assistant in Congressman Smith's office; he is listening to me and trying to help any way he can.

The mayor of Jackson has done absolutely nothing to help the residents. To this day he has done nothing. He does not answer our phone calls and continues to ignore the problem we are having. He is making no effort to help the people of Jackson, the same people who voted him into office. This is totally unacceptable. The council members have stated at a public council meeting that they "do not have caterpillars on their property" and offered no help.

At that council meeting I was shocked at the way the council members behaved. It's a disgrace the council members were so arrogant and to see their lack of compassion or concern for the residents of Jackson. The assemblymen and senators do not take calls from the residents, and their aides tell me it is a municipal problem and we need to address this to our mayor.

I find this unsatisfactory and think I deserve a response from someone. And when I advise them I have done so and my mayor says "my hands are tied," I seriously do not know where to turn for help as a resident of Jackson, Ocean County and New Jersey. I think the mayor, council members, assemblymen and so on need to be reminded that they were put into office by the people and their job is to help the people. The job they are doing is totally unacceptable.

I don't know who can I turn to for help. I also would like to know if this is normal procedure for all these officials put into office to have the right to tell me that they cannot help me, ignore me and offer me no help at all. I thank you in advance to anyone that wants to help me.

Arlene Greenway is a resident of Jackson.