Fall 2003 Edition 

What Local Officials Drink Wendy Dabney, Chair of Fair Lawn’s Environmental Commission “I drink and cook with bottled water, mostly because I hate the strong chlorine taste of  Fair Lawn water especially in the summer.  I am also concerned about pesticide run off. I find it ironic that many residents have the lawn poisons and fertilizers applied in the AM, followed by the Poland Spring delivery in the PM and they never make the connection between the two!  As Olympia Dukakis said in "Moonstruck" -"Don't !@#* where you eat..” Ken Garrison, Borough Engineer   I drink tap water from the fountain in the hallway, filling my mug a number of times per day.  Deputy Mayor Marty Etler I have been drinking unfiltered tap water for 49 years and all of my inside pipes seem in good order.   Mayor David Ganz Tap water, and for colder water, tap water filtered by Brita from the fridge. Former Mayor Ed Trawinski I mostly drink seltzer. However, when I do drink water, I along with my family, drink it from the tap in my home. Former Mayor Bob Gordon I use bottled water for reasons of taste, not safety. Based on current government requirements and recent test results, Fair Lawn water exceeds the safety standards. In fact, the water produced from our own wells, because it is treated in Fair Lawn's own "air stripping" purification system, exceeds the quality of water produced by either the United Water or Passaic Valley reservoirs. However, Fair Lawn water is "hard" because of the naturally-occurring elements in our bedrock, which affects the water's taste (at least for me). For that reason, I buy water by the jug. Assemblyman Matt Ahearn My family uses a counter top pitcher with an activated charcoal filter for drinking and cooking water. Tap water gets used on occasion but we try to avoid it when possible. I also have a hand operated reverse osmosis biological filter/pump I use if we need larger quantities of water quickly and don’t have the time for the slow drip method. That came in handy after Hurricane Floyd! The filters are a bit more expensive than charcoal types. Besides, from the smell of the tap water I gather that we have more than enough chlorine in it to kill any living organisms. Without adequate laws in place to protect consumers from the greed of those who will sell anything to make a buck or two-to-ten-million, bottled water is not guaranteed to be any safer than what comes out of our taps -- even if it does taste better and lack the occasional yellow-brown tint of Fair Lawn’s water. I don’t like to buy bottled water unless it is "to go."