Persistent Flooding Leaves Brick Residents Seeking Help, Answers

BRICK, NJ — For months, residents of the Normandy Beach section of Brick have found themselves on an island. Literally.

"I cannot drive in the streets," Larry Reid, a resident of the section of the township on the barrier peninsula, said Friday, as storm-driven waves washed over the bulkheads again, flooding Broad Avenue, Normandy Drive, and 6th Street, among others.

It was so bad that Brick Township Police Chief James Riccio went out to the area with the township's two Hummers, to help residents get to and from their homes. A Nixle alert warned drivers to avoid the area because of the flooding.

"I think it's the worst since Sandy in terms of street flooding," said Reid, who has lived on Normandy Drive since 1997. The problem has been persistent since Superstorm Sandy battered Ocean County on Oct. 29, 2012. While homes have been rebuilt and elevated, the flooding has continually worsened.

"It's frustrating," township Business Administrator Joanne Bergin said Friday afternoon. "We want to do something about it and we are doing something about it."

The solution isn't going to be instantaneous, however. The township is awaiting a proposal from ACT Engineering, one of the firms in its pool of professional services, on how to approach the flooding.

"We have over 12 neighborhoods where this is happening, it's not just a Normandy Beach issue," Bergin said.

Friday's flooding in Normandy Beach was just the most recent reminder of the issue that has been brought forward at Township Council meetings over the last few months. Reid shared videos he took, showing water from Barnegat Bay crashing over the bulkheads near Normandy Drive and Broad Avenue, and showing water flowing along Broad Avenue like a river.

"My house has water around it every single day," one woman said at the Jan. 28 Township Council meeting. On New Year's Eve, the street was so flooded none of her family to get to her home for a planned gathering, she said.

The woman and other residents said they have been in contact with Elissa Commins, the township engineer, and business administrator Joanne Bergin, but they expressed concerns at the lack of tangible solutions.

"We have to do something at a much faster pace," another resident said.

Bergin said township officials met with a group of Normandy Beach residents and two representatives from FEMA about the issues and what help is available to address them.

What they learned is that to get grant funding, they have to present FEMA with tangible solutions that show there is a cost savings to addressing the flooding. The hard part of that, she said, is that FEMA considers the road flooding nuisance flooding, because it doesn't involve damage claims.

"I don't like that term because what these residents are dealing with is more than just a nuisance," Bergin said.

She said ACT engineers have been meeting with residents of all the affected neighborhoods to design solutions for the problems across all of the neighborhoods.

"I want to see short- and long-term solutions," Bergin said, including something to temporarily mitigate the flooding until a more permanent solution can be put in place.

Getting that accomplished will require funding from outside sources, Bergin said. "This is beyond one municipality's budget to manage."

To get a grant from FEMA "we need more than stories of hardship," she said. "We need data. Their stories alone and experiences won't be enough."

That is what township officials believe ACT Engineers will help them compile: information so complete that it improves the chances of getting a grant.

"You have to go the extra step, be as construction-ready as possible, because if you have to wait two years for permits, they won't see it as a priority and they'll move on," Bergin said, referring to the FEMA grant process. "There are so many municipalities competing for these grants."

That was what Normandy Beach residents stressed at the Jan. 28 meeting: that the issues are not merely an annoyance, they are an almost-daily problem that continually worsens.

"We just want to get some assurances that something is being done," one resident said.

"We're not turning a blind eye," Bergin said. "We'll make sure people are safe and make sure people can get in and out."

"We know it's frustrating," she said.

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