↑Jacobs, Andrew. "Back From the Abyss", The New York Times, March 1, 2001. Accessed March 28, 2016. "It was 1997 and despite the region's revved-up economy, West Orange looked as if it were sliding into the abyss.Perched at the edge of New Jersey's most distressed urban places, this classic postwar suburb of 45,000 people faced a welter of seemingly intractable problems."