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NOW it makes sense: Jersey City sewers get so clogged with restaurant oil that they get backed up and make Jersey City smell like poop. Mystery solved!

To think these idiots are dumping this on the street when people down south are robbing it from restaurants!

Thieves stealing used cooking oil for biodiesel
BY STAN FINGER
The Wichita Eagle

The price of gasoline has gotten so high that people have begun to steal used cooking oil.

"There's somebody, or multiple people, out there stealing our cooking oil," said Ben Healy of Healy Biodiesel in Sedgwick.

Healy's company converts used vegetable cooking oil into biodiesel, and he has contracts with more than 100 restaurants in and around Wichita to pick up their old oil.

But thieves have been cutting into locked storage areas behind restaurants since mid-March and stealing the vegetable oil, he said. While he doesn't have a precise number, Healy said, the total stolen is in the thousands of gallons.

"It's getting to where it's hurting us pretty bad," Healy said.

Wichita police Lt. Joe Cutcliff said the thieves may be taking the oil elsewhere for resale -- or they may be simply be trying to convert the vegetable oil into biodiesel for their own use.

"This is the first case that we've had" of cooking oil theft, Cutcliff said.

Healy fears it will be far from the last.

"I would say that there's a lot of people doing it -- taking it for biodiesel and making it in their garages or barns," he said.

Can't speak to the guilt or innocence of Skinner's Loft (although I do find their fare altogether too grease-laden to be palatable), BUT illicit dumping of cooking oils into municipal sewers is an open secret in the restaurant trade.

In fact, the WSJ had an A-head (cover story feature) about this very problem a couple of years ago. I recall reading therein that Chinese restaurants allegedly were the most notorious offenders.

Maybe the solution is pumping the sewers full of Lipitor! I'm sure the Jersey phrama lobby can convince the state assembly to add a budget provision to fund such a worthy cause...

Sounds like a bio-fuel heist gone bad.

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As far as the cop is concerned he should have stated he was on duty and to engage in answering the inquiry would have distracted him from monitoring the safety of the area; but not in so many words of course. Or he could have stated " oil spill". I had a cop give me a cut & dry answer to what was happening.

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Maybe the hired help "incharge" of handling discarded cooking oil tried to cut corners and took a shortcut in disposing of said oil.

I was wondering why there was sand all over the street. It was cooking oil?? Why would a restaurant dump oil in the middle of a street? That cannot be true.

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Hmmmm........a Jersey City cop acting like a colossal ignorant a-hole for no good reason? Hard to believe.

(insert sarcasm here)

If you did have a problem, I believe that you think Barrow street is called "Barrows".

Doesn't justify the 'tude however.

so much for JCPD's "Courtesy" in the C.A.R.E. department motto...

This afternoon on my way to Brick Haus on the corner of Barrows and Newark, I noticed that Newark Avenue between Barrows and Grove Street was completely blocked off by the police. I was and am concerned since I am a resident nearby and asked the local police (i.e., car #2997) what was the problem. He quipped by stating, "Do you have a problem?" I walked away.

I simply asked a concerned question just like any other normal resident would regarding the circumstances. Why is it that the police officers in Jersey City have so much attitude?

From word of mouth, I found out the reason for the closure of the road. It appears, Skinner's Loft allegedly dumped used cooking oil onto Newark Avenue.

Does anyone have additional information regarding this nuisance? I would appreciate it if I was cognizant of all the facts. Thank you.

Thousand Dollar Question
Who is going to pay for this debacle?