Source: http://www.nj.com, July 26, 2017
By: Tom Haydon
A couple that owned a businesses in town and became sick from leaking underground tanks owned by an adjacent business can sue the township for damages because the tanks were partially on municipal property, the state Supreme Court ruled Wednesday.
Edna and Edan Ben Elazar owned an electronics business in the township, and suffered long-term respiratory illnesses that were eventually traced to underground fuel and chemical tanks that belonged to the adjacent Macrietta dry cleaners, formally known at Swan dry cleaners, according to the court decision.
After the couple opened their business on North Avenue in 1988, they noticed odors coming from the cleaners. However, it was only in 2012 that a possible connection was made between those chemical odors and the illness the two people suffered.
Although the underground tanks were removed in 1998, the owners of the dry cleaners hired an environmental clean-up company in 2011 to test their property for a remedial clean-up, and that company discovered levels of chemical contamination in the ground that had spread under the Ben Eliazars’ business.
The environmental company notified the township and the state Department of Environmental Protection and the Ben Elazars.
However, it was not until the following year that the couple learned that the township had approved the installation of the underground tanks in 1946 and that the tanks were partially under township property.
In 2012, after Edan Ben Elazar’s doctor confirmed that his long-time asthma problems could be linked to the chemicals, the couple filed a tort claim notice with Cranford officials, indicating their intention to sue. The next year the couple filed suit against the township and the owners of the dry cleaners.
Both the husband and wife still suffer from respiratory illnesses, said their attorney, Stuart Lieberman.
“It’s really just a tragedy. It’s been really, really tough. Mr. Ben Elazar has asthmas. He really had very severe breathing problems,” Lieberman said. He said the husband and wife are now retired and living in Florida.
Cranford opposed the lawsuit, and filed a motion to throw out the case, claiming the couple initiated their legal action long after the time limit for filing it had expired. A Superior Court judge granted the motion, and a state Appellate Court upheld that decision.
On Tuesday, however, the Supreme Court justices reversed the lower courts.
In a 24-page decision written by Justice Jaynee LaVecchia, the court found that the couple filed the tort claim within the time limits.
“We glean no evident lack of diligence here in failing to earlier detect the township’s responsibility for its role in allowing the tanks that leaked to be on its property,” the court said in the decision.
The court ordered the case back to Superior Court.
The Ben Elazar’s lawsuit against the dry cleaners had been delayed pending the outcome of the appeal involving Cranford.
A lawyer for Cranford declined to comment on the decision.