Newark’s Genova Burns and West Orange’s Trenk, DiPasquale, Della Fera & Sodono, along with Elnardo Webster II, a former partner of both firms, have agreed to mediate a dispute with the Newark Watershed Conservation and Development Corp. over their role in advising the agency, which is now in the process of dissolving following investigations into its spending practices.
The agency has also forged ahead with an adverse action in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey against its former board of trustees—including U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, D-NJ, who chaired the board while he was mayor of Newark—and numerous officers and employees, as well as accountants and other financial professionals that advised the agency. The complaint, filed Nov. 6, alleges all of the defendants contributed to the failure of Newark Watershed, a quasi-governmental agency that ran Newark’s water supply for decades before coming under state scrutiny for alleged improper spending and eventually agreeing to dissolve. The agency filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in January.
