Arms Race Ramps Up Along NJ Shore

Christie DEP Bay Head Sea Wall Approval Spawns Race to the Bottom

Shock Doctrine: Shore Towns Seek Failed Engineering Solutions

View of Cape May, NJ, from Lighthouse (Nov. 2009)

After Governor Christie’s cheerleading for rebuild, DEP’s abdication of their coastal regulatory responsibilities, and DEP’s recent foolish approval of a 1,300 foot sea wall in Bay Head, stuff like this was inevitable: (Press of Atlantic City)

Cape May mayors rally to strengthen seawall

 

CAPE MAY — Hurricane Sandy may finally provide the argument the city has been searching for to raise the seawall and extend the oceanfront Promenade on the east side of town.

The issue goes back almost two decades and has been broached by at least three mayors. According to Mayor Ed Mahaney, it has been shot down by the state Department of Environmental Protection five times.

Cape May officials not only seek failed engineering solutions that have been rejected several times by NJ DEP, they now double down and are attempting to justify them by appropriating the language of coastal vulnerability assessment and adaptation:

He [Mayor] said the city engineers are just starting to look into how high to extend the seawall to alleviate flooding.

“It’s our weakest link in recent storms,” Mahaney said. “That is the area of greatest vulnerability to us.”

As we’ve noted here, and as other coastal states have learned, sea walls do not work and make the problem worse (see: Memo to Gov. Christie: Sea Walls and Engineering Don’t Work

“New Jersey was really a giant science experiment,” he’d told me.  “New Jersey was the home of some of the first vacation spots and one of the first places to arm their beaches. Thanks to New Jersey we learned that any sort of hard stabilization—sea walls, groins, and jetties—was very damaging to the beach.  We learned that the damage occurs just by building something fixed by the beach—could be a highway, for instance. The problem of beaches is that they are eroding and always moving.  The beach tends to move toward that fixed thing and get narrower and narrower and narrower until it disappears altogether.” […] [Professor Pilkey]

The Cape May Mayor’s warped perspective is part of the political reaction to disasters.

As Naomi Klein wrote in the “Shock Doctrine”, disasters become opportunities for reactionary forces to impose really bad and discredited policies. Recent glaring examples of that are:

• Following the Wall Street collapse, which was enabled by deregulation and lax oversight of financial institutions, right wing forces advocated for further deregulation;

• In the immediate aftermath of the Sandy Hook school slaughter, the NRA proposed armed police and guns in schools;

• In the wake of Superstorm Sandy, Gov. Christie championed a “Rebuild Now!” strategy

The Cape May Mayor is engaged in classic “shock doctrine” tactics, by seeking DEP approval of a sea wall that they have soundly rejected previously, numerous times.

And given the DEP’s recent approval of a sea wall in Bay Head, the Mayor just may get that approval this time around.

The current Christie/Martin DEP’s extremely bad coastal policy agenda is one of the best reasons to establish an independent regional Coastal Commission to manage the shore redevelopment and climate change adaptation planning process.

Instead of sea walls, here’s what we flagged almost 3 years ago, that needs to be the focus on the discussion.

The above Cape May photo accompanied this Nov. 16, 2009 report

JERSEY SHORE HIGHLY VULNERABLE TO STORMS AND SEA LEVEL RISE

Environmentalists Urge Corzine Administration to Include Global Warming and Land Use Reforms in Pending Insurance Industry Bailout

TRENTON- As Corzine Administration officials met quietly behind closed doors with insurance and finance industry leaders to discuss a statewide insurance fund to finance catastrophic shore storm risks, environmentalists called on the Governor to incorporate much needed coastal development and global warming policy reforms in any industry bailout package.

Numerous scientific studies and NJDEP Reports show that the over-developed NJ shore is increasingly vulnerable to hurricane and storm related wind, storm surge, and flooding damage. Those risks are magnified by the effects of global warming induced sea level rise. NJ already is among the worst states in the nation for payouts on repeat claims under the federal flood insurance program. While risks are great and growing, DEP’s own studies show that public awareness is low, and local and state disaster planning and emergency response capabilities are woefully inadequate.

Despite these significant risks, continued over-development, particularly in known high hazard areas along the shore, puts more people and property in harms way, greatly increasing not only risks to life and property. The probability is increasing for a catastrophic coastal storm event that would cause huge economic dislocation.

The multi-billion dollar scope of the problem and potential insurance liability has led insurance industry leaders to withdrawn from insurance markets in the tri-state region, and to seek a public bailout of insured liability.

[read the specific recommendations here]