Neighbor Says He Knows Who Dumped 500 Pounds Of Pasta In Old Bridge

OLD BRIDGE, NJ — We all know it's been cloudy in the past week in New Jersey, and now with an actual chance of meatballs?

Neighbors are saying they know who dumped 500 pounds of cooked spaghetti in a wooded area of Old Bridge last week, and that it was a man moving out of his mother's house after she died.

The pasta has since been cleaned up, but it was first brought to public attention by Nina Jochnowitz, an Old Bridge resident. She said a fellow resident contacted her on April 26 to let her know that someone dumped a large amount of cooked pasta in a wooded area near two streams by Hilliard Road.

Keith Rost told NBC 4 he thinks the pasta was dumped there by a military veteran who was moving out of his mother's home after she died, and he was getting rid of a stockpile of food in her house.

He said the pasta was uncooked when it was dumped by the creek, and that the heavy rains made it wet, making it appear like it had been cooked.

"A good estimate is more than 500 pounds of pasta dumped adjacent to the streams intersecting with Hilliard and Mimi," Jochnowitz wrote on Facebook on April 26.

Two days later, she said Old Bridge Township DPW read her post, and responded by doing a rapid clean-up of the spaghetti dump and surrounding river basin.

But she said there is a larger issue:

"Old Bridge residents have requested for many years to get bulk garbage pickup in our town," said Jochnowitz. "This administration has ignored the entire residential community about this. Old Bridge is the only town in Middlesex County without bulk garbage pick-up."

"As my friend called it a 'Mission Impasteable,'" said Jochnowitz. "The Mayor and his possy (sic) continue to ignore the Sixth Ward. For us in the 6th ward it comes and no surprise when we see the dumping of construction and other garbage spewed in all of the neighborhoods. This week, there was a new type of dumping, of excessive food, PASTA."

Old Bridge Police have declined to comment on the incident, or say if they have any leads as to who illegally dumped the pasta. No charges have been filed in the illegal dumping.