Years after Ford Motor Co. was forced to return to Ringwood to dig up thousands of tons of toxic paint sludge it had dumped on the mountain, that job is still not finished — and may never be.
Ford has removed nearly five times the amount of pollution it hauled out in previous cleanups of its old dumpsite. But despite government assurances that the work will finally be done right, Ford may once again be allowed to leave contamination in an area that serves as the watershed for 2.5 million North Jersey residents.
Further complicating cleanup 
efforts, Ford said it has no records to indicate how much waste was dumped in Upper Ringwood — so it’s unclear what contamination remains hidden in this rugged terrain.
A generation after the 500-acre tract was first declared a Superfund site, residents and environmentalists remain skeptical that the community will ever be made whole. Read more.
In 2005, The Record launched an award-winning series, outlining the saga, including a flash presentation, which at the time was cutting-edge.
This is a 3 part series - a documentary 5-years in the making, that began with the original series in 2005, and culminates in December 2010, when the residents finally received their settlement money. But the ending for many was far from victorious.
