What Really Went Wrong and who is Actually at Fault: A Reply to Art Gallagher
Years and decades of fiscal mismanagement, waste and dereliction is what went wrong in New Jersey, New York too. Mother Nature did what she does…our local, county and State governments did what they do. That’s what happened.
The usually probing, insightful and fair Art Gallagher, proprietor of the indispensable More Monmouth Musings, takes an uncharacteristically deferential stance on the absurdity of inaction following Sunday’s blizzard. Because I ordinarily agree with Art, rarely have I the opportunity to take issue with his conclusions.
But you know me, having been granted that opportunity, I’m on it like a Democrat to an earmark.
Dispensing with the non-issues first, my friend Art has a reasonable gripe with New Jersey’s answer to the Grey Lady and that with that much of his post I have no quarrel; the Asbury Park Press will never pass up an opportunity to enflame passions when they think it will hurt Republican leadership or help the Democrats. He’s also correct in noting that this storm, as every storm, is not a personal storm in that it affects everyone who lives under the snow umbrella.
That’s where our agreement ends.
Art states:
“Forecasts as late as Saturday night were predicting snow falls in Central Jersey in the 12-18 inch range. It wasn’t until just a few hours before the storm hit that any forecaster was talking about accumulations of 25-30 inches with 55 mph winds.”
Yeh…so? Again dispensing first with the fact that the APP lied, (which is not news at all as they do so on a daily basis), the fact remains that a 7-12 inch alteration in the anticipated accumulation is not a rational dividing line between municipal action and inaction. I doubt there’s a scientific formula for this, but if it’s going to snow more, you get out sooner. What is so freakin’ hard about that? This isn’t the storms fault, it’s the municipalities fault. It’s the County’s fault and it’s the State’s fault. Period.
Art continues:
“but the truth of the matter is that New Jersey’s various governments don’t have the equipment or the personnel to handle the this type of weather quickly. That is why the clean up is continuing now, 48 hours after the snow stopped falling.”
Because I don’t know whether this is an accurate statement or not, I’ll simply reply that it very well may not be an accurate statement. However, even assuming that it is an accurate statement, that in no way absolves townships from working with what they do have and doing so in an intelligent, proactive manner. Again, if you know that 12-18 is coming, you get out ahead of it and continue making as much progress as possible. If you learn that another 7-12 is coming…you get the idea.
That…didn’t…happen.
And let me use this opportunity to elaborate on operating in what I believe to be an “intelligent” manner. Leaving aside for the moment the very real possibility that not a single municipality in Monmouth County had adequately budgeted for a weather episode of this magnitude, why wasn’t there any discernible contingency plan? I was stranded in Tinton Falls overnight Sunday and Monday because the train was sporadic at best and the roads were simply too treacherous to attempt a drive.
However, on what became a 45-minute, half-mile trip to 7-11 for rock salt, my buddy and I saw at least a half a dozen private trucks, like Art’s, with plows at the ready just wandering around Hope Road with no place to go. You want to talk about “shared services”? There’s exhibit freakin’ A right there. I ask you Art, had Highlands or any other Bayshore township called you up and asked for a bid to help plow whatever streets you could, would you have done it?
In anticipation of a response, I’m going out on a limb and saying that the answer is “yes”. Why Monmouth County townships don’t have a list of private towers is literally beyond me.
But that didn’t happen, did it.
Again, not the storms fault, the government’s fault. If they’re going to take responsibility for this area and tax their citizens at the highest rate in the Country, you’re goddamn right they better be prepared to do their jobs when an inevitable storm hits. Gandalf the White didn’t conjure this storm up out of thin air.
Art:
“The DOT crews were out.”
Good. They should have stayed out.
“The visibility was terrible.”
That’s what floodlights are for. They’re driving a two-ton caterpillar…cry me a river.
“It was dangerous to be plowing. It was snowing too hard too fast.”
Really Art? I hate, absolutely hate to agree with the deplorable and incredulously hypocritical Ed Rendell on this one, but give me a friggin’ break. Even were I to accept that it was “too dangerous to be plowing”, why weren’t they out the second the snow stopped and for the entire rest of the day thereafter?
I assure you, they weren’t. Don’t let your lying eyes deceive you.
I won’t take on Art’s conclusions about Christie and Guadagno being out of the State because it’s a dead issue, except for this little nugget:
“Does anyone really doubt that Christie would have returned to New Jersey given the “state of emergency” if it was possible? The airports were closed. They are just opening today.”
Uh…yeh, I do. The New York Football Giants-heads hung in shame-retunred to Jersey today. Does anyone really believe that the Governor of the State of New Jersey couldn’t get home if he wanted to? That’s ridiculous. I have friends who mish-mashed their way home from San Diego and arrived in Newark this morning at eight. Nobody can tell me with a straight face that America’s favorite Republican rock star and the Governor of New Jersey couldn’t get home if he wanted to.
It was a bad political move on his part to not come home. It’s really a dumb leadership move too considering how well he is leading the charge against the aforementioned fiscal mismanagement, waste and dereliction in this State. I’ll get over it, but he blew a golden opportunity to take it up even another notch.
The teacups will be there next year Chris.
Bottom line, I hope two things happen as a result of this storm: 1) I hope hundreds and hundreds of citizens begin taking a keen interest in how their tax dollars are spent at the local level and start attending township committee meetings in droves to voice their opinions, and 2) I’ll be doing some research into the snow removal contingency budgets in several Bayshore towns for the last 5 years to see if, in fact, everything that should have been done, was done.
I’m not keeping my fingers crossed; wouldn’t want them to get stuck that way.
En Garde Art!
Russ
Russ
Sorry…sorry. I forgot.
My bad.
Reader Comments (3)
....and the politicians in this state largely are willfully ignorant of how furious we taxpayers are with all of 'em. In my borough, private citizens, private contractors and a few city vehicles cleared things up. Teamwork. But private citizens at our own expense helped out others ... for the greater good, and yes we all pay irrationally high taxes too. If I hadn't had to pay my property taxes this year I could have bought a nice little Kubota and could have helped my neighbors all up and down the block.
This group of state and local politicians needs to be pruned back severely with a set of metaphorical budgetary hedge trimmers. Government is too big, too inefficient and too ineffective to deal with this or any other real crisis. It's a kind of collective stupidity which multiplies by the number of bureaucrats involved.
If you don't think so, then witness at a national level our federal reaction to real crises in the last several years. Are any FEMA responses something that does you proud? Any? I didn't think so. And these are the people who have our health care and our food production, as well as our carbon emissions, now in their hands. Don't you feel better already? Not.
If you're not enraged, what is it going to take? Get involved; join the Tea Party. Kick 'em all out. Defund ineffective and expensive programs. Take our state back.
The lady in the 2nd photo helped me dig my car out! Someone must have snapped that photo while she was helping someone else. What a good samaritan she was! Funny how the cold stopped being a factor as we labored together.
"If you don't think so"
I do think so Shel. Thanks for the comment.
"Funny how the cold stopped being a factor as we labored together."
Funny how that happens ain't it!