1. Introduction
For decades, the aquifers and soils beneath a 35-acre parcel in Old Bridge Township, New Jersey, have been quietly marinating in toxic byproducts of industrial production. According to a complaint filed by the United States Department of Justice on December 10, 2024, against Arnet Realty Company L.L.C., Old Bridge Minerals, Inc., and HB Warehousing, LLC (collectively known as “the Defendants” for the remainder of this article. I ain’t typing out all 3 of their names every time I want to talk about them), metal contamination at the CPS/Madison Superfund Site (“the Site”) poses an imminent and substantial endangerment to public health and the environment.
The government’s lawsuit lays out a disturbing picture of groundwater contamination and toxic soils that have lingered for years, allegedly due to the Defendants’ operations and failure to adequately remediate.
What’s damning—and perhaps most alarming—are the facts presented right at the outset of the legal complaint (attached down below):
- A sprawling, 35-acre Site in Old Bridge Township has harbored high levels of metals in the soil and groundwater for years.
- Contaminated groundwater has threatened a critical watershed, risking the health of surrounding communities who rely on local water sources.
- Multiple companies—Old Bridge Minerals (formerly Old Bridge Chemicals, and corporate successor to Madison Industries), Arnet Realty, and HB Warehousing—currently own or operate portions of the Site yet, according to the complaint, have not conducted the necessary cleanup to ensure the full protection of public health.
In the broader context of corporate accountability, corporate ethics, and corporate social responsibility—themes that have become increasingly urgent under the pressures of neoliberal capitalism—the allegations against these evil corporations fit a familiar pattern. Time and time again, we find industrial polluters evading the true financial and moral costs of their environmental damage, relying on patchwork fixes or inadequate remediation efforts, until government agencies finally intervene. Indeed, as the complaint shows, partial cleanup efforts have been going on since the 1990s, yet critical contamination remains, prompting the Department of Justice and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to demand more comprehensive action.
The economic fallout from such corporate pollution can be devastating for local communities, who shoulder the risks to their health, property values, and livelihoods. Worse, in many of these Superfund narratives, the polluters have historically turned a profit—even amid the legal battles—while local populations foot the bill for medical issues, decreased land values, and lost economic opportunities. Allegations of corporate greed and corporate corruption become inescapable when, as the complaint contends, companies with knowledge of potential harm do not swiftly eliminate the threat.
Against this legal backdrop, the Defendants face both a demand for reimbursement of the government’s already-incurred cleanup costs and a proposed injunction that mandates a far more extensive remediation plan for what the EPA calls the First Operable Unit (“OU1,” addressing groundwater) and Third Operable Unit (“OU3,” addressing contaminated soils). This speaks to how an entire industrial system, shaped by deregulation and profit-maximizing incentives, often creates situations in which corporations weigh the costs of polluting against the potential fines or lawsuits. The complaint underscores how regulatory capture and the complexities of environmental law can prolong resolution and drag out accountability.
This article aims to dissect the core allegations, interpret them within the context of the wealth disparity and neoliberal capitalism that frequently shape environmental enforcement, and explore how these allegations illustrate deeper structural failures. We’ll follow an eight-section arc:
- Introduction – Setting out the most damning allegations and providing context for this high-stakes legal struggle.
- Corporate Intent Exposed – Examining the allegations that Defendants knew about, or should have known about, the contamination and analyzing the underlying corporate mindset that may have contributed to inadequate cleanup efforts.
- The Corporate Playbook / How They Got Away with It – Looking at the typical tactics—cost-benefit calculations, limited admissions, legal maneuvering—that companies often employ to avoid or minimize liability, and how these are reflected in the timeline of events at the Site.
- Crime Pays / The Corporate Profit Equation – Delving into the notion that it may have been financially expedient for the Defendants to delay full remediation, letting them continue their operations while externalizing the costs of pollution onto the public.
- System Failure / Why Regulators Did Nothing – Investigating potential lapses, complexity, or underfunding in federal and state oversight that let the contamination persist for decades, along with the broader phenomena of regulatory capture.
- This Pattern of Predation Is a Feature, Not a Bug – Showing that the Old Bridge case is emblematic of a wider trend, where corporations repeatedly engage in hazardous operations and half-hearted cleanups because they operate under incentives that prioritize shareholder returns over community welfare.
- The PR Playbook of Damage Control – Mapping out how companies typically respond to damaging revelations—press releases highlighting minimal compliance, announcements of partial fixes, attempts to shift blame—and how the complaint suggests a mismatch between the PR front and the actual remediation needed.
- Corporate Power vs. Public Interest – Concluding with a reflection on how local communities bear the brunt, why the government’s lawsuit is crucial but not necessarily transformative, and what it will take to shift the system toward genuine corporate ethics and public health protection.
Along the way, we’ll maintain a clear separation between what the complaint specifically alleges and broader patterns gleaned from other environmental disputes. By looking at official court documents alongside historical precedent, we can better understand how corporate pollution remains a systemic feature of the political-economic landscape, one that fosters continuing crises for the environment, health, and social justice.
2. Corporate Intent Exposed
2.1. The Allegations from the Complaint
When the Department of Justice (“DOJ”), on behalf of the EPA, goes to the trouble of filing a federal lawsuit, it typically means they believe that not only do strong facts back the allegations, but that prior measures—consent orders, administrative negotiations—have reached a dead end. Here, the complaint alleges that the Defendants are liable for contaminating soil and groundwater at a site that has been under close environmental scrutiny since it landed on the National Priorities List (NPL) in 1984.
That listing alone—the NPL being a roster of the most hazardous sites in the country—signals the severity of the environmental and health risks.
How the Contamination Happened
Old Bridge Minerals (formerly Old Bridge Chemicals, and corporate successor to Madison Industries, Inc.) produced inorganic chemicals—particularly zinc salts, copper chemicals, and other compounds—for decades at the property that is partially owned by Arnet Realty and partially owned by HB Warehousing. Over the years, manufacturing byproducts containing metals allegedly leaked, spilled, or were otherwise released into the soils and groundwater. The federal government contends that such repeated disposal or release of hazardous substances included metals that easily seeped below ground level and migrated through the aquifer.
Existing Remediation Attempts
Decades ago, in the early 1990s, the Defendants or their corporate predecessors installed three groundwater recovery wells to address metals contamination. They later replaced these with a pump-and-treat system known as the “Interim Remedial Measure” (IRM), which has been operating under the oversight of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP). Yet, despite these measures, the contamination has not been fully contained, according to the complaint, and the government continues to report “actual or threatened releases of hazardous substances” from the Site into the environment.
Failure to Complete Cleanup
While some partial steps have been taken, the actual soils (OU3) and certain areas of the groundwater contamination (the portion of OU1 that deals with metals) have never been fully addressed. As a result, the levels of toxins—specifically metals—remain high enough to warrant a remedial plan the EPA believes is crucial for safeguarding the health of residents and protecting natural resources.
What stands out to me is how this legal complaint lays the blame squarely at the feet of the Defendants, stating they are “liable for all OU1 response costs for metals contamination and OU3 response costs incurred by the United States.” This language implies that the government sees them as owners and/or operators who had authority over disposal practices and should have taken the lead on addressing the pollution. The complaint also insists that the same defendants must perform the mandated cleanup actions that the EPA has specified in the official Records of Decision (RODs) for these areas.
2.2. Parsing the “Intent”: Did They Know?
While civil complaints do not require the government to prove “intent” in the sense of intentional wrongdoing, the gist is that Old Bridge Minerals and its predecessors either knew or should have known that their operations were harming the environment.
After all, the presence of IRM wells since the 1990s shows that the companies were well aware of metals contamination migrating off-site. Furthermore, the complaint underscores that these same operators had “installed three groundwater recovery wells downgradient of their property” to intercept the contaminated water entering the Runyon Watershed—a crucial local water source. Such measures are not undertaken lightly; they indicate recognition of the problem.
The government’s stance, therefore, is that the Defendants had ample warning about the severity of metals contamination but allegedly did not implement the kind of thorough, site-wide remedy that might have mitigated the ecological and public-health threat. Whether or not this is a matter of “greed,” “negligence,” or standard “profit-driven risk calculation” is a question the trial (if it goes that far) and subsequent negotiations might elucidate.
2.3. Broader Industry Norms of Concealment
If you look at historical analogs—from large-scale cases involving petrochemical spills to smaller industrial sites leaching heavy metals—there’s a recurring pattern: once contamination is discovered, companies will often rely on stop-gap measures to demonstrate “action” and stave off regulators, all the while minimizing immediate cost outlays. Over time, that can evolve into partial compliance, which can continue for years, if not decades. Such a pattern is especially pernicious under neoliberal capitalism, where profit-maximization can take precedence over fully internalizing environmental costs. The complaint’s narrative suggests that rather than shutting down production or undertaking an exhaustive cleanup, the Defendants pursued a narrower, more limited strategy, perhaps hoping these minimal measures would suffice.
In many industries, corporate leadership grapples with whether to launch a major capital project to overhaul waste disposal or remediation systems or to put short-term band-aids in place. The complaint strongly implies that the latter prevailed here. While the text of the complaint does not provide a “smoking gun” memo, it does not have to. The central fact—that contamination persisted for decades—offers a stark demonstration of either intentional or reckless disregard.
3. The Corporate Playbook / How They Got Away with It
3.1. Leveraging Incremental Remediation to Stall Comprehensive Action
The heart of the “corporate playbook” in environmental contamination cases often lies in strategic compliance: companies do the minimum necessary to appease regulators in the short term, while delaying or avoiding a complete, expensive fix. The complaint recounts a decades-long history of partial measures, from the three groundwater recovery wells to the more recent IRM wells that Old Bridge Minerals (and its predecessors) have been maintaining under the NJDEP’s Performance Monitoring Program. These efforts, while presumably well-intended or at least partially effective, never resolved the underlying soils contamination or the deeper groundwater issues.
For the evil corporations here, continuing operations at the Site while chipping away at the cleanup requirements likely made commercial sense, particularly if the production of fertilizers, pharmaceuticals, or food additives remained profitable. Although the complaint does not detail the precise volume of chemicals produced nor the annual profits, it notes that these were “inorganic chemicals” used across multiple industries, which typically suggests robust demand.
3.2. Navigating Regulations to Minimize Liability
Under neoliberal capitalism, deregulation and limited enforcement resources often make it easier for polluters to avoid the most stringent oversight. Even though environmental laws like CERCLA exist, the intricacies of compliance—combined with potential regulatory capture—can undermine the law’s bite. The complaint calls out the fact that the Defendants continued operating a partial remedy under state oversight for years, yet apparently never reached a final site-wide solution for all contaminated areas.
There is no indication that the Defendants wholly ignored regulators; rather, they appear to have stayed in the system, performing certain tasks, signing certain agreements, and thus avoiding full-blown litigation—until now. That’s a classic approach: maintain the status quo, appease regulators with incremental steps, and hope either technology improves, the regulations get looser, or the full extent of contamination remains poorly understood. In the meantime, the public often remains at risk.
3.3. Legal Maneuvering
Another typical maneuver is to keep negotiations with state agencies going indefinitely, where the budget constraints of those agencies limit deep oversight or hamper the push for a final, large-scale remedy. In the Old Bridge case, the complaint references the role of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection in overseeing performance monitoring and the IRM wells. Over the years, the interplay between state and federal roles can be complicated, and it is not uncommon for potential polluters to exploit jurisdictional overlaps or slow-moving administrative processes.
Furthermore, many corporations take advantage of the complexity of CERCLA itself. The law’s reliance on “Operable Units” can mean that companies remediate in phases, focusing on one piece of a site while letting other contaminated areas stay unaddressed. Indeed, the complaint references how the overall CPS/Madison Superfund Site was broken into OU1 (groundwater) and OU3 (soil) for the portion relevant to the Defendants, with another OU for soils on a neighboring BASF parcel. This segmented approach, while logical from a project management standpoint, can encourage foot-dragging if not monitored aggressively.
4. Crime Pays / The Corporate Profit Equation
4.1. The Externalization of Costs
A key premise of the government’s CERCLA claims is that the Defendants, by not performing a thorough cleanup, allowed hazardous metals to persist in the environment and shift the associated costs onto the public sector and the ecosystem itself. This is the classic scenario of corporate greed and corporate pollution in which companies bank profits from industrial operations while “externalizing” the health and environmental costs. As long as local residents bear the brunt of potential contamination of their water supply, farmland, or property values, the corporation can keep production humming.
When the complaint demands that the Defendants pay back the EPA for the “response costs incurred,” it highlights exactly how such externalization works. Public funds have already been spent on investigations, monitoring, and partial cleanup. The government’s lawsuit seeks to recoup these expenditures. CERCLA operates on the principle that polluters should pay—corporate accountability at its most direct. However, the repeated necessity for lawsuits underscores a system in which polluters often only pay late in the game, long after the damage is done and public resources have covered critical aspects of remediation or emergency response.
4.2. Why Delaying Environmental Cleanup Can Be “Good Business”
From the vantage point of short-term financial logic, it can be profitable for a company to stall. Even a moderate delay can defer the upfront costs of major remediation. Meanwhile, production lines keep running, generating revenue. Over time, some corporations may gamble on changing regulations, hoping for more favorable standards, or they might try to negotiate a cheaper cleanup deal later. While the complaint here does not expressly allege a deliberate strategy of delay, many watchers of corporate behavior see in the historical record a well-worn tactic of “just enough to keep the regulators at bay.”
4.3. Corporate Consolidations and Shell Games
The complaint notes that Old Bridge Minerals is the successor to Old Bridge Chemicals and Madison Industries, Inc. That alone raises the question of whether changes in corporate ownership or structure can complicate the lines of legal responsibility. If a corporation can spin off polluting segments, fold them into new entities, or rebrand under new names, it can hinder legal accountability and obscure the trail of liabilities. The United States, in this case, has tried to ensure that the newly named or restructured entity, Old Bridge Minerals, does not escape the obligations incurred by its predecessors. This is precisely why the complaint states that each of the Defendants is liable as a “person” under CERCLA and points to successor liability, ensuring that a corporate name change does not wipe the slate clean.
Such reorganizations are not unusual. Under the logic of neoliberal capitalism, if a transaction or name change can yield financial advantages—such as shedding liabilities or securing new lines of credit—companies frequently jump at the opportunity. The question is whether environmental obligations get lost or minimized during that shuffle, forcing government agencies to chase new legal entities in order to hold them accountable. That cat-and-mouse dynamic is a hallmark of corporate corruption patterns we see across various industries, though the complaint here does not accuse the Defendants of direct fraud—merely continuity of ownership.
5. System Failure / Why Regulators Did Nothing
5.1. CERCLA’s Complexities and Limited Enforcement
One might read the allegations and wonder: How could such contamination persist for decades at a site on the EPA’s National Priorities List? Isn’t the NPL reserved for the most hazardous waste sites in the country, ensuring swifter remediation? In theory, yes. However, the complexities of CERCLA often slow progress. The law involves multiple stages: Preliminary Assessment, Site Inspection, Hazard Ranking System scoring for the NPL, Remedial Investigation, Feasibility Study, Proposed Plans, Records of Decision, remedial design, remedial action, and so forth. Each step can take years, particularly if the responsible parties resist or contest the findings.
The EPA does not have unlimited manpower or funding, either. Superfund appropriations have waned over time. The original “polluter pays” tax that helped fund federal cleanups lapsed for many years, diminishing the resources the EPA could draw from. Meanwhile, the number of contaminated sites increased. Regulatory agencies, tasked with overseeing all of these sites, often have to prioritize immediate threats—like explosive methane buildups or acute releases—over contamination that can seem less urgent if it remains somewhat contained. Thus, “low-priority” but still dangerous pollutants can linger for far too long.
5.2. The Role of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection
The complaint references how the Defendants have been operating some remedial measures under the oversight of the NJDEP. This state-federal shared jurisdiction can cause further complications. Typically, the EPA and states enter into cooperative agreements, but each side might have limited budgets, staff, or political incentives that affect enforcement vigor. The Defendants, for their part, can exploit these complexities by fulfilling only what the state currently enforces, while the federal side might not jump in forcefully until a crisis arises or local pressure mounts.
5.3. Regulatory Capture and the Broader Context of Neoliberal Capitalism
More broadly, under a neoliberal framework that prizes market solutions and minimal government intervention, environmental agencies often operate with limited political support. Industry lobbies press for more lenient regulations, or for industry “self-reporting” protocols rather than stricter oversight. Over time, this fosters regulatory capture—where regulators become so entangled with the industry they oversee that the lines between public interest and private interests blur.
The cumulative effect is a system in which a site can languish on the National Priorities List for decades. The complaint signals that the site was placed on the NPL in 1984. It is now 2025, over forty years later, and only partial cleanup has happened in OU1 and OU3. While the complaint doesn’t detail the behind-the-scenes interactions with regulators, that timeline alone suggests serious systemic breakdown. Ultimately, the entire community is left vulnerable; neither the state nor the federal oversight consistently ensures that polluters complete a timely and thorough remediation.
6. This Pattern of Predation Is a Feature, Not a Bug
6.1. Drawing Parallels to Other Industries
The story unfolding at the CPS/Madison Superfund Site mirrors many other environmental fiascos across the country. In the chemical sector, large players—from petrochemical giants to smaller niche producers—have historically weighed the short-term gains of production against the potential future costs of environmental harm. The phenomenon is not exclusive to chemicals; corporate greed in resource extraction, agribusiness, and pharmaceuticals has often led to health crises and economic fallout for communities living near polluting facilities.
We see it in catastrophic events like the lead contamination in municipal water supplies, or industrial-scale spills that ravage rivers and coastal wetlands. Over and over, corporations weigh the bottom line of continuing or expanding operations against the intangible future liabilities if or when regulators eventually enforce the law. Under neoliberal capitalism, these calculations often align with continuing harmful operations until forced to change by either legal pressure or public outcry.
6.2. The Reliance on Superfund as a “Safety Net”
CERCLA’s creation in 1980 was an acknowledgment that industrial contamination posed severe and recurring risks—yet the state and local agencies lacked the capacity to handle them. Today, we see the law repeatedly invoked as communities discover toxic legacies in their backyards. It’s a “safety net” meant to hold polluters accountable when state-level oversight or corporate goodwill falls short.
However, the fact that we continually rely on the Superfund program to do emergency triage underscores a structural problem in how we oversee industrial operations. Instead of preventing contamination through robust regulation and frequent inspections, the system largely reacts once contamination is discovered. Then, it can take years of negotiations and litigation—like the current case in Old Bridge—to force the polluter to pay for the damage. By then, the local population might have already suffered health effects, reduced land values, and the intangible stress of living next to a known hazard. For these reasons, many environmental advocates argue that the pattern of delayed cleanup is a “feature, not a bug” of a system that rewards corporate risk-taking over precaution.
6.3. Public Health and Community Impact
Although this legal complaint is laser-focused on the legal aspects—reimbursement of EPA costs, ordering the Defendants to perform a remedial action—it does not dwell on the day-to-day effects on nearby residents. Which honestly makes sense given the fact that this is a legal document…
In many similar pollution cases, communities around industrial sites report higher rates of certain illnesses or fear drawing their water from local aquifers. Even if a direct link to adverse health outcomes can be challenging to prove in court, the intangible anxieties and potential stigma remain.
Corporations’ dangers to public health become more evident if one considers that metals contamination in groundwater can involve substances like zinc, copper, and potentially other heavy metals if manufacturing processes were not tightly controlled. While zinc and copper can be beneficial at trace levels, they become harmful when present in large concentrations. Local wildlife, farmland productivity, and biodiversity can also be compromised.
This broad array of possible harms is the reason the government invests substantial resources into investigating contaminated sites. Yet, from a social-justice perspective, there is an ongoing frustration that these polluters do not proactively take full responsibility. They wait for legal action to force compliance, even when corporate social responsibility would demand more proactive stewardship of the environment.
7. The PR Playbook of Damage Control
7.1. Common PR Tactics in Environmental Lawsuits
Although the complaint does not quote any press releases from the Defendants, it’s standard for companies facing environmental litigation to deploy a well-worn PR playbook:
- Minimize the Problem: Emphasize that contamination levels are low, that the pollution is contained, or that it occurred “long ago” before modern standards were set.
- Highlight Partial Compliance: Point to the IRM wells or monitoring programs as evidence of responsible corporate behavior.
- Frame It as a Partnership: Suggest that the company has been working “collaboratively” with regulators.
- Shift Blame: Sometimes, the entity might argue that prior owners caused the majority of contamination, or that other pollutants from different sites commingled with their own.
Given that Old Bridge Minerals had a name change and is the successor to multiple entities, we might see disclaimers that these were “legacy operations.” Meanwhile, Arnet Realty and HB Warehousing might claim they are merely property owners with limited operational control. All these angles are typical in environmental liability suits.
7.2. Discrepancy Between PR and Remediation Realities
While partial compliance is certainly better than no effort at all, the complaint frames these measures as insufficient to eliminate the ongoing hazard. The discrepancy between claiming “ongoing remediation” and the EPA’s conclusion—that contamination still threatens the local water supply—remains stark. For local stakeholders who rely on safe groundwater, the mere existence of a partial remedy for decades is no comfort if pollutants still persist at unsafe levels.
Worse, from a corporate ethics standpoint, robust PR spin can mask or trivialize legitimate health concerns. This tactic can undermine local advocacy efforts, as residents might be misled into believing the problem is solved. The lawsuit itself can be overshadowed by statements from corporate spokespeople claiming they are “fully committed” to environmental stewardship—yet in reality, the state has to keep a close eye on the same old IRM system, while the truly comprehensive remedy remains undone.
7.3. Community Advocacy vs. Corporate Messaging
In many Superfund sites, community groups gather scientific data, hold town halls, and push for an aggressive timeline. Corporate PR, by contrast, may revolve around reassuring investors and the media that the matter is under control. The filing of a federal lawsuit often shatters the veneer of controlled messaging. The complaint, with its pointed demands for injunctive relief and cost recovery, signals that negotiations with the Defendants have reached an impasse.
What remains to be seen is how local residents respond and whether they will muster enough political pressure to accelerate the cleanup. In an era of wealth disparity, local communities might lack the resources to mount extended legal or media campaigns, especially when going up against well-funded corporate legal teams. This imbalance of resources and influence is part of what fosters skepticism among consumer-advocacy and social-justice groups, many of whom question whether large corporations will truly mend their ways when they have more financial incentive to keep causing harm if that’s what maximizes shareholder profits in the short run.
8. Corporate Power vs. Public Interest
8.1. The Stakes for Local Communities
In Old Bridge Township, the intangible fear is that environmental toxins in groundwater can migrate unpredictably, potentially impacting wells, farmland, and even local ecosystems for generations to come. Even if the contamination stays at sub-acute levels, the stigma alone can depress home values, reduce tourism, and hamper local businesses. Economic fallout from pollution is not solely about fines or lawsuits; it’s also about the intangible but real ways a community’s growth and confidence are constrained when saddled with a “toxic” label.
Furthermore, there’s a human dimension: families who worry about letting children play on certain patches of land or near streams, older residents who question whether decades of living near industrial sites might have compromised their health, and small-business owners whose prospects are overshadowed by bad press about the environment. These are the everyday burdens that rarely appear in strictly legal documents—though they remain in the background, fueling the moral argument for swift, decisive cleanup.
8.2. Prospects for True Corporate Accountability
If history is a guide, Old Bridge Minerals, Arnet Realty, and HB Warehousing could do one of the following:
- Settle: Enter into a consent decree with the United States, agreeing to reimburse past response costs and implement the EPA-selected remedy at OU1 (metals) and OU3. This is the most common outcome in CERCLA litigation, though it sometimes takes months or even years of negotiation.
- Litigate: Fight the lawsuit, perhaps contesting liability or the extent of contamination. This can prolong uncertainty and escalate legal fees. If the government eventually prevails, the corporations would be on the hook for the government’s past costs plus a mandatory cleanup.
Either way, if the ultimate resolution mirrors typical Superfund suits, the companies will eventually commit to a multi-phase remediation plan, likely costing millions of dollars. The question is whether they will do so vigorously or merely meet the bare minimum. In an ideal scenario, we might see a robust, transparent cleanup that ends with the site restored to safe conditions, benefiting both the environment and local residents. But that often depends on consistent regulatory enforcement and public pressure to ensure no corners are cut.
8.3. The Larger Problem of Neoliberal Incentives
At the highest level, the Old Bridge case is but one instance in a vast national tapestry of corporate pollution. Under the pressures of profit-maximization, it’s common for corporations to skirt environmental responsibilities. Despite the existence of CERCLA, regulators remain underfunded, and structural incentives encourage corporate risk-taking. The threat of lawsuits—while real—does not always outweigh the near-term financial calculus. Many companies continue polluting until forced to stop by litigation or crisis.
This pattern demonstrates how corporations’ dangers to public health are not merely accidental oversights; they reflect a rational calculation in a system that penalizes compliance less severely than it should. Without a shift in the legal and economic frameworks, we can expect more communities, more aquifers, and more ecosystems to face slow-motion disasters like the one alleged here.
8.4. Pathways Toward a More Just Future
In an ideal world, robust corporate social responsibility guidelines—enforced rigorously—would deter polluters before they foul an entire region. Realistically, though, while we might wish for thorough oversight that prevents contamination, incremental improvements often depend on headline-making cases that galvanize political will. The Old Bridge litigation could serve as one such rallying cry, compelling local activists and national environmental organizations to ask bigger questions about how to restructure the incentives that govern industrial operations.
Wealth disparity also factors in, as the burden of pollution often falls disproportionately on lower-income communities that lack political capital. To rectify that imbalance, environmental laws must be matched with community empowerment initiatives, legal aid, and consistent media attention. When local voices are amplified, polluting corporations can find it harder to hide behind press releases and partial fixes.
Lastly, skepticism about whether “large corporations will actually change” is well-founded in a system that prioritizes shareholder returns over community well-being. Nonetheless, lawsuits like the one filed by the DOJ and the EPA at the CPS/Madison Superfund Site are crucial in pushing back. They show that polluters are not above the law, that the government can demand accountability, and that the drive for economic efficiency need not justify long-term harm to public health.
Conclusion and Final Thoughts
This story is precise what happens when neoliberalism takes over: cleanups drag on for years, local communities remain at risk, and the environment suffers. Even with a strong legal framework like CERCLA, enforcement alone cannot solve the deeper structural issues that allow or even encourage polluting behavior.
Whether the Defendants will mount a defense or quickly settle remains to be seen. What is certain is that the government is now demanding more comprehensive action for OU1 (where metals contamination lingers in groundwater) and OU3 (where tainted soils remain). Ideally, a robust remedial action plan—and the financial resources to support it—will mitigate the corporations’ dangers to public health in Old Bridge Township. Yet, the deeper lesson is how each new lawsuit underscores a fundamental flaw in our economic system: when profit-centered motives meet weak or delayed enforcement, the losers are almost always the environment and the most vulnerable members of society.
Still, there are glimmers of hope. The Superfund program, though imperfect and occasionally underfunded, stands as a testament to the possibility of corporate accountability. Lawsuits like this underscore that polluters can be compelled to pay for—and conduct—the necessary cleanup. In so doing, they challenge the standard corporate narrative that tries to minimize or defer blame.
We need stronger regulations and better-funded enforcement as well as a shift in the corporate paradigm itself—one that places public interest, social justice, and genuine corporate ethics above the bottom line.
Otherwise, the cycle of contamination, litigation, and partial cleanup will continue, and local communities will remain the collateral damage of a system that normalizes the externalization of environmental harm. Only through a more proactive approach—and a legal framework that truly forces polluters to internalize the costs of their actions—can we break free from a pattern that has long enabled corporate greed to trump the well-being of people and the planet.
Look at the 2000s era-ass flash lookin’ website that Arnet Realty has got going on lmao https://arnettrealty.com/ this is what they bought with all their destruction??

sources from the federal government in case you would rather read them there instead of downloading the attached PDFs:
https://www.justice.gov/enrd/media/1379726/dl?inline
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