Questions About Response to Irene Linger

A month after Hurricane Irene, Springfield residents are still demanding answers.

At the most recent Township Committee meeting, dozens of residents from the neighborhood hardest hit by the hurricane packed into the Springfield Township Committee meeting to lodge complaints with official effort during and after Hurricane Irene.

During the heated session, residents accused officials and township employees of failing to provide adequate warnings beforehand, mishandling the hurricane while the storm was happening and failing to follow up with help and answers after the storm. Elected officials, public works employees and other figures were criticized, but the harshest criticism was directed at the Office of Emergency Management.

Township employees said they understood the anger in consideration of the storm’s devastation.  “We’re not going to change their minds,” Scott Seidel said. “They suffered a catastrophic loss. It’s hard to deal with.”

Nonetheless, township employees said that residents were not aware of what they did during the hurricane.

“The biggest problem is that if people didn’t see it, it didn’t happen,” OEM Director John Cottage said.

At a public meeting, Alvin Street resident noted that OEM Director Cottage, who lives on Alvin Terrace, moved his car to higher ground prior to the storm.

“I wonder why it didn’t occur to him to alert his neighbors,” she asked, noting that she lost three cars in the hurricane. “I could have saved my cars and been out of my house if the emergency manager had done his job.”

In an interview after the meeting, Cottage pointed to Governor Christie’s repeated warnings prior to the hurricane for people in flood zones to prepare for the storm.

“The warnings were more than sufficient,” Springfield Township Engineer Sam Mardini said. “There was three weeks of scary information to the public before the storm. In fact, people wondered if it was too much.”

Residents said that officials and emergency workers were nowhere to be found during the hurricane. Township employees say they were on the scene early and often.

The post storm cleanup has been slow and frustrating, residents said, saying that the trash and waste removals did not clear all materials from lawns.

“What’s on my front lawn is my entire first floor,” another resident said.

The Township’s actions after the hurricane also came under criticism, with some residents asking why Township Officials haven’t continued to go after state agencies. One resident warned that he and his neighbors were working towards filing a class action lawsuit against the Township Committee, the state and the county.

“We already have a lawyer ready to go,” he said.