EATONTOWN — The Borough Council authorized a remediation plan for the disturbed wetlands area at the proposed Husky Brook Park and referred plans for the park back to the Recreation Committee at the June 9 workshop meeting.

The council gave Birdsall Engineering Inc., Eatontown, the borough engineering firm, approval to prepare plans for the remediation of the violated wetlands area in Husky Brook Park after some discussion.

Borough Engineer Jim Priolo, of Birdsall, explained what the remediation plan would involve.

“We would create a remediation plan that will correct the violation area and rebuild the wetland pocket. Basically … we have to do some survey work to get the actual grades, do a grading plan to reshape that, do a water budget to make sure enough water comes in there,” Priolo said.

The plans would then be subject to Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) code enforcement approval.

Priolo estimated that the preparation of the plans would cost around $20,000 and that the remediation work could cost up to $50,000.

Neither of these estimates, Priolo said, include potential penalties from the DEP, which, Priolo said, could be up to $15,000 a day; however, Priolo believes the borough may not be penalized.

“It is my opinion that if we successfully remediate, there is a good chance we may not have to pay anything,” he said.

Prior to the council’s decision, Priolo had presented another option.

“The other alternative,” Priolo said, “would be, if you wanted to move forward with a new design for the upland piece, we could move forward with the design and work on the correction of this wetlands area at the same time.”

Mayor Gerald Tarantolo originally favored this option.

“I suspect that may be a better way of approaching it because if you integrate the modification to the violated area, there may be a cost benefit by doing it as part of a bigger project,” he said.

However, members of council disagreed.

“We’re still taking an unknown cost and moving forward; that’s my issue,” council President Dennis Connelly said.

The “unknowns” also bothered Councilman Kevin Gonzalez.

“I’d like to get some more information and change the ‘mays’ to ‘definites.’ Let’s deal in absolutes before we move forward, just considering the history of the project,” he said.

“If you want the absolute, then we move forward with getting the violation area corrected,” Priolo suggested.

Priolo went on to recommend correcting the violation before moving forward on the project.

“Remediating it now is probably your best option. The potential savings, if you tried to do both at the same time, may be with some of your soft costs, because you’re working with one plan. But I don’t know if that’s really going to be significant,” he said.

While the remediation is under way, the recreation committee will re-evaluate the park’s layout, given the new, official wetlands delineation.

“Let’s just tell rec, ‘This is the largest piece of paper you have to color with, give us some good ideas,’ ” Councilman Anthony Talerico Jr. said. “But I think we should move forward, notwithstanding the fact that … we’re probably going to spend a lot more money vindicating our principles, right as they may be.”

Tarantolo also insisted that Eatontown had not caused the violation and suggested challenging DEP.

“There’s another factor here that we’re missing, and it really bothers me, and that is, we inherited the violation in that area.”

Tarantolo said he has a photo of the area from the 1980s showing the violation existed prior to Eatontown’s purchase of the property

Borough Attorney Andrew Bayer said that Eatontown could potentially challenge the DEP if it issues a fine; however, the borough would be responsible for remediating the violation, regardless.

“It’s our problem as the current property owner. If we didn’t deal with it at the time we obtained it, we’ve inherited that problem.

“Regardless of whether the DEP penalizes the borough or whether or not we are found responsible for the violation, as the property owner we’re responsible to remediate it whether or not we caused it, correct?” Bayer asked Priolo, who agreed.

“Either way, we would be on the hook for the remediation,” said Bayer.

The roughly $800,000 park project, which was voted down by the council during its Dec. 2, 2009, meeting, has been a point of contention between the mayor and several members of council.

At a meeting later in December, the council voted 5-1 to approve a resolution that seeks to recover some $96,000 from the borough’s former engineering firm, T&M Associates, for designing the park plan, despite objections from Tarantolo, who said such a move could leave the municipality open to litigation.

Council members in favor of recovering money from T&M Associates claim that the park plan was marred by problems since it was first revealed that the firm failed to secure the proper wetlands permits from the DEP that were needed to move forward with the project before beginning work on the park.

Under the terms of the resolution, the town has authorized its professionals to “pursue any and all remedies necessary to obtain reimbursement from T&M Associates of all monies expended and all damages incurred in connection with the Husky Brook Park project.”

Borough Administrator George Jackson said that Eatontown has not yet reached a settlement with T&M.

“Currently, our borough attorney … is in negotiations with T&M. We have ongoing discussions with them to settle that issue,” Jackson said in an interview on June 18.