By DONALD WITTKOWSKI
Fred Caspar walked into City Hall holding a jar that contained a stinky, slimy liquid that could have turned anyone’s stomach.
He showed it to members of City Council during their meeting Tuesday to underscore his frustration with a mysterious source of fetid water that lurks in the gutter on 38th Street in front of his home and others on the same block in Sea Isle City.
“It will just sit there,” Caspar said.
The murky, brown liquid in the jar that Caspar carried into the Council Chambers was collected from the gutter on 38th Street between Landis and Central avenues.
Tuesday’s Council meeting represented the third year in a row Caspar has appeared before the governing body to ask Sea Isle officials for their help in identifying the source of foul-smelling water and preventing it from lingering in the street.
Council President J.B. Feeley assured Caspar that the city will investigate and “do what we can.”
City Business Administrator George Savastano said he plans to take a look at the water and try to pinpoint its source. He raised the possibility that it may be coming from an underground stream or some other source.
“It could be groundwater. It could be anything,” Savastano said in an interview after the Council meeting.
Caspar, who lives in Williamstown, N.J., has had a summer vacation home on 38th Street since 2009. He said the stagnant water started to appear a few years ago after an old house dating to the early 1900s was demolished on 38th Street and replaced with two single-family homes.
“If there’s no breeze, it’s a little skunky smelling,” Caspar said of the water in an interview in front of his home at 137 E. 38th Street.
The puddles of water simply refuse to dry up, even during blistering summer heat waves, he said.
“I’ve been here for 14 years, so I know that it’s always coming,” he said.
Caspar noted there are days when he wants to remove the paper and other debris floating in the water. However, he often leaves the trash alone out of fear there may be something toxic mixed in with the puddles.
The street, curb, gutter and even some of the driveways have been stained with a brownish-green tint from the algae-like water.
In addition to having a nauseating green hue, the water also has an oily sheen and a stinky odor that suggests it has an unpleasant origin somewhere in Sea Isle.
One unsubstantiated rumor going around the neighborhood for the past few years is that there may be abandoned railroad tracks buried underneath this section of 38th Street, homeowners said. Old railroad ties coated in creosote could explain why the water has an oily sheen, the neighbors have surmised.
Mary Corson, a resident of 117 38th Street since 2000, said she has been told by one longtime Sea Isle resident that maps show an old railroad line once ran through this part of town many years ago.
“We used to have train tracks here,” Corson said.
In the meantime, Caspar and Corson are growing impatient that the city hasn’t stopped the water from collecting in the gutter and street. They want the city to install a better drainage system.
Neighbors on 38th Street became so frustrated at one point that they had a street cleaner come by to remove the foul water in 2021.
Corson is also worried about the possibility of even more serious consequences from the puddles of water. She pointed to a section of 38th Street near her house that was cracked and appeared slightly depressed.
“It looks like a sinkhole. But who knows?” she said.
