Toxic Crab Outreach in the Newark Bay Complex: Working with Local Liaisons to Communicate the Dangers of Eating Contaminated Crabs

Kerry Kirk Pflugh, Lynette Lurig and Harold Nebling

New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, 401 East State Street, Trenton, NJ 08625

609-292-2113, 609-633-1458

Recreational fishing in the United States is a multi-billion dollar business.   In the State of New Jersey with its 127 miles of Atlantic coastline and numerous rivers, lakes and streams, fishing is a popular pastime and a lucrative business, including the industrial northeast.  Here recreational anglers share local waterways with industry, business and residential development.  Additionally, in the Newark Bay Complex, recreational anglers must contend with the strictest fish consumption advisories in the state.  These advisories have been in effect in this region for nearly 20 years.  Due to chemical contamination of the sediments, and subsequent contamination of the fish and crabs that live in the affected waters, New Jersey issued health warnings in the early 1980's warning citizens against consumption of certain species of fish and crabs.  This was followed in the early 1990's with a ban on the taking of blue claw crab due to unsafe levels of dioxins and PCBs.  The blue claw crab is the "fish" of choice in the Newark Bay Complex.

In May 2002, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) held a major press conference in the City of Bayonne to announce to residents in the Newark Bay Complex the results of a risk assessment conducted on Blue Claw crabs.  Essentially, the risk reported to the public was that you could safely eat only one crab every 20 years from the Newark Bay Complex.  In an effort to sustain the message, the NJDEP initiated a Toxic Crab outreach effort to complement existing fish consumption advisory outreach and education programs.

Since that time, the NJDEP has funded approximately six programs annually.  These outreach programs developed and implemented by local organizations have expanded the Department’s reach into the communities of concern. 

This presentation will talk about the methods used to recruit and work with local organizations, how partnerships have been forged and sustained, the products and programs developed through this effort and the preliminary results of a survey of Newark Bay Complex anglers conducted in 2005 to determine how these programs may have resulted in less consumption of crabs on the part of our urban anglers.