New Jersey city lets truck inspections lapse 15 years

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A city in New Jersey has come under fire for letting truck inspections lapse for up to 15 years.

A Union City Department of Public Works employee blew the whistle on the skipped inspections, which included dump trucks that had not been inspected since 2001, according to NJ Advance Media.

Public works driver Marco Basualdo said he first tried telling city officials about the lapsed inspections, but when no one corrected the problem, he decided to approach the media.

After NJ Advance Media first reported the story three weeks ago, which included an interview of Basualdo standing next to his truck with an expired inspection tag, Union City Mayor Brian Stack took action.

“I had all the vehicles inspected,” Stack says in a story NJ Advance Media ran today. “DPW, everything passed. I had one truck out of service, it’s a ’92, that didn’t pass. But we put that out of service a while ago. Everything else passed.”

The New Jersey Sierra Club had publicly criticized Stack, who is also a democratic state senator, and his administration for not keeping up with truck inspections.

“It’s good that he stepped up,” Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club says. “It’s important when something is wrong that not only the mayor takes responsibility for it, but that they also get it fixed. It’s important not only to the employees, but it sends message to the other towns. It’ll make our roads safer and our air cleaner.”

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