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Interlaken’s borough council met on Wednesday night in the midst of continued power outages in the borough caused by Hurricane Sandy, which struck on Monday, Oct. 28.

Residents and council members discussed the lack of electricity in town as well as other post-storm issues. Some residents may need to do work on their properties before power can be fully restored, officials said. This process could be prolonged because so many residents live elsewhere in the winter, they said.

DOWNED TREES AND POWER LOSS

Some residents and council members expressed frustration with how long it’s taken for electric company JCP&L to restore power to the borough, where about 284 are still without power, according to data from FirstEnergy.

“We’re a small town, I understand that,” said resident Robert Cancelleri. “But you give us one truck? I think that’s unacceptable and I think it’s a disgrace. I’ve been sitting in my house and it’s 40 degrees. I think it’s disgusting.”

Councilman Robert White said that electric company Jersey Central Power and Light [JCP&L] is still attempting to restore power to the area.

“It’s my understanding that JCP&L and the tree crews have been in town since 2 p.m. Tuesday, and that’s when they started their assessment,” White said. “Their first priority was the substation, and once they found that operational and got rid of the damage over there they started assessing here, and started entering backyards to look at damage.”

JCP&L was also hindered by the nor’easter that was dumping several inches of snow on the area the night of the meeting, White said. The storm had also caused high winds and rain during the day.

“They’re ready to turn the circuits on, but the weather prevented that,” White said.

Power will not be returned to homes that have yet to clear downed trees or other storm damage from their property, White said. Homeowners who have already fixed any damage will get power back, even if their neighbors haven’t removed their debris yet. Homes that require homeowner action before their power can be returned have been marked with a red sticker by JCP&L, he said.

Members of the council were still concerned about how to reach homeowners who needed to make repairs before getting power back. As Interlaken has a large number of homeowners who live in town only during the summer, it is possible they might not know that work needs to be done on their property.

“People need to know that you need to cut the tree down, get an electrician, you need to get a new meter on, you need to get set,” said Councilman Thomas Morely.

“Because what’s going to happen is everyone’s going to get their power on and you’re going to have six or seven elderly people sitting there in the cold not knowing who to call, they’re not going to get their power on, it might take them another week for JCP&L to come back and retrofit them back in,” he said.

Council members planned to approach JCP&L for a list of residences that were marked with a red sticker so they can get in touch with homeowners and be sure they know what needs to be done before they can get their power back. Other information the council wanted from JCP&L included an action plan for returning power to the affected areas in town.

SUGGESTIONS FOR THE FUTURE

Police Chief and head of OEM [Office of Emergency Management] Stephen Carasia attended the meeting to update the council and hear some suggestions for emergency procedures in the future.

Councilman Corey Folta said he was dissatisfied with how the borough and council responded to the hurricane.

“I think Interlaken did a lousy job communicating with residents during the storm. There was just one reverse 9-1-1 call and one letter. And I’ve learned from other municipalities who really did an excellent job,” said Folta.

He listed other affected towns like Ocean Township, Neptune, Holmdel and Freehold, who used various combinations of reverse 9-1-1 calls, Facebook pages, Code Red, hand-delivered information to people without cell phones or power, and the Nixle emergency notification system to stay in touch with residents during the storm.

Chief Carasia said that Interlaken already uses Code Red and Nixle, but residents have to sign up for these emergency notification systems.

Councilman Folta pointed out that before Hurricane Irene hit in 2011 the Police Department collected contact info for every resident, in case of an emergency.

“We still have that information, in case of an emergency and something going wrong with your house. That’s all in the Code Red system, but [with] Nixle, we can’t just put that in. I’m not sure how many people use it. In one of our newsletters we put it out that we had it,” Carasia said.

“I think the residents don’t know, because I certainly didn’t know,” Folta said. “I’m not trying to place blame, I just think we could do a better job.”

Online communication has been a problem for the municipality. Although the municipal building has power, the server for the official borough website is still down.

The council members discussed using Facebook pages for OEM and the borough as an alternative way of keeping residents informed.

Council President Keith Harris thanked Chief Carasia and his officers for their work during the hurricane and its aftermath.

“I think you for your comments and I thank you and all your officers for the time and the effort and the overtime and everything that you’ve done to keep us safe,” said Harris.

FEMA REIMBURSEMENT: TREE-GRINDING

The council authorized the purchase of new equipment to aid in debris cleanup and the use of an Ocean Township grinding site to dispose of downed trees.

The cost of both operations will be reimbursed by FEMA [Federal Emergency Managment Agency], which is offering emergency assistance to towns dealing with the effects of Sandy, borough administrator Dawn McDonald said. The deadline for submitting these costs is this Friday, Nov. 19. By that time all the cleanup work must be done, invoices dated and purchases made.

McDonald said she had been approached by Jason Burke of Burke Construction in Ocean Township about using a different site to dispose of trees ripped up by the storm. Ocean Township has a grinding site at Joe Palaia Park in Oakhurst.

“We’ve been taking everything to Reliable Wood Products, which from what I understand is a twenty-minute ride, twenty-minute wait on line to dump, and a twenty-minute ride back,” said McDonald.

Burke recommended to McDonald that they approach an Ocean Township administrator for permission to dump debris at the Joe Palaia Park.

“It’s probably going to be cheaper than dumping at Reliable or about the same, but what you’re going to get is a quicker turnaround.”

If approved by Ocean Township, the borough would hire Burke and Burke Construction to transport the trees to the grinding site.

“He’s anticipating two 10-hour days, which puts us within the FEMA deadline,” said McDonald.

FEMA REIMBURSEMENT: EQUIPMENT

The other purchase approved by resolution was of equipment, including a new front-end loader to clear debris.

The purchase of a new front-end loader has appeared on council agendas before, as the older 1984 Case model used by the town was reportedly wearing down before Sandy hit.

Before Sandy, the council had planned to purchase a different model. The change caused some controversy with council members.

“If the front-end loader was the 521 model that we originally intended to buy as opposed to the 621 that we’re now planning on buying, I’d have no problem with buying the 521, but I’m opposed to buying the 621,” said Councilman Robert Napoli.

Napoli’s argument was that the additional $22,000 used to buy a 621 model instead of the less expensive 521 could be better used for other emergency response operations.

“This resolution is saying we need $22,000 to clean up the town, and that may be covered by FEMA. And we’re reacting with that  by a different type of loader than was originally anticipated because of the emergency nature of it. But that might not be the end of the $22,000, there could be other issues where we’ll need to pass another emergency resolution,” said Napoli.

He also suggested that if the DPW [Department of Public Works] couldn’t handle the work, the borough could hire contractors rather than go to the additional expense for the front-end loader.

Councilman Robert White argued that FEMA’s reimbursement of the front-end loader purchase made the question of which model they bought unimportant.

“In this two-week window, we have the opportunity to have a third party come in and assist the DPW with that job. And that makes perfect sense to me, and I think to the people on this council, and to the residents of the town,” said White.

White argued that the priority is to clear the debris across town.

“Let’s get the streets cleaned as quickly as we can, because the leaves are continuing to fall. If the issue is the $22,000 it’s not really an issue, and if it does become an issue it’s good money well spent,” said White.

White expressed frustration with the delay in purchasing the loader.

“Had we taken the older machine out of service from the last meeting and didn’t go through all that rigamarole for having it inspected or whatever, it wouldn’t have been an emergency two weeks ago. And now it’s too late, now we are in an emergency,” said White.

“We’ve got every street in town covered in debris. It needs to get cleaned up. So we put together a plan to do it, we found a piece of equipment that’s available in ten days, let’s do it. It has to be done. There’s no ifs ands or buts about it,” said White.

The next Interlaken council meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, Dec. 5, at 7:30 p.m. in Interlaken borough hall.

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