Use of Christie in Sandy ads cleared by feds

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Attention Highlands and Sea Bright residents: Your input matters

New Jersey Future has teamed up with a research scientist from Carnegie Mellon University to support Highlands and Sea Bright in our effort to develop a long-term resiliency plan.  One part of this support involves reaching out to and engaging with the public to talk about flooding risk and plausible solutions. To that end, they developed a short survey to understand how best to talk about these issues with community members.

Please help our community in its plan for recovery and resiliency.This 10-15 minute survey will ask about your beliefs on flooding and flooding risk. Your answers will help Highlands, Sea Bright and New Jersey Future make plans for long-term community resiliency.  In a few months, New Jersey Future will publish a summary of the answers given by the community.

Here is the link to the survey:  http://njfuture.org/risksurvey

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Spend $500, get a FREE Pound of Butter

I like butter.

Maybe the Azzolina and Scaduto families that run Food Circus-Foodtown bought a marketing program that spits out rewards for products their customers like, but the “NOT COUPONS” I received the last couple of days are not motivating me to fill the freezer by Thursday by purchasing another $350.19 worth of groceries.

The four sticks of free butter if I spend $350.19 by Thursday doesn’t make me feel appreciated either.

That their staff greets with me a smile and some of them know me by name makes me feel appreciated.   The gift cards, free turkeys or hams, at Thanksgiving and Christmas make me feel appreciated.  But I would shop there even if they didn’t do those giveaways.

That Food Circus-Foodtown opened in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, before they had power, so that Bayshore residents could get non-perishable food, really makes me appreciate them.

Lou Scaduto and his team run a fine business.  They missed the mark with this promotion.

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A Shore Thing To Help Sandy Impacted Families

The Foundation to Save the Jersey Shore is hosting a “high-spirited, beach-casual” fundraiser at Windows on the Water, Thursday July 24 at 6 PM.  Tickets are only $75, almost all of which will go directly to families and individuals who are still displaced after Hurricane Sandy.  The food, alcohol and entertainment have all been donated.

Co-founded by businessmen Warren Diamond, NFL Veteran Phil Villapiano and Kevin Leahy after they personally witnessed the destruction of Sandy in their own and surrounding communities on the Jersey Shore, The Foundation to Save the Jersey Shore assists local families, businesses and municipal leaders in rebuilding. Click here to read some of what they have accomplished.

“The news media may have moved on from the devastation of Sandy, but we haven’t,” Diamond said, “Although much of the visual damage has been addressed through repair and demolition, we are looking at thousands of our neighbors who are still struggling to get back into their homes. They are committed and tenacious—they refuse to walk away, and that keeps us focused and inspired.”

Tickets to the event can be purchased here.

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Christie in Keansburg Monday Morning

MMM photo/Art Gallagher

Governor Chris Christie is scheduled to be in Keansburg on Monday morning, 10:30am, to make an announcement and give updates on the Homeowners’ Elevation Program.

The event is scheduled to take place at a private residence at 57 Beaconlight Ave.

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Ocean Grove Opens Its New Boardwalk

Dr. Dale Whilden, President of the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Assoc, Assemblywoman Caroline Casagrande, Sen Jennifer Beck, Gov Chris Christie, Congressman Chris Smith and Neptune Mayor Dr. Michael Brantley cut the ribbon of Ocean Grove’s rebuilt boardwalk

After being twice denied funding from FEMA before finally getting $2.4 million on their second appeal, the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association re-opened their boardwalk to the public today with a ceremonial ribbon cutting lead by Governor Chris Christie, Congressman Chris Smith, Senator Jennifer Beck, Assemblywoman Caroline Casagrande, Neptune Township Mayor Dr. Michael Brantley and Dr. Dale C. Whilden, President of the OGCMA.

“Today is truly a great day for Ocean Grove, Neptune Township, Monmouth County, and the Jersey Shore, and a critical step forward in our recovery from Sandy,” said Smith.”This boardwalk is an integral part of Ocean Grove the neighboring Jersey Shore community, a fact we reinforced during our efforts to reverse FEMA’s original decision at the local level—and yet another at the regional level—to deny critical funding.”

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Why Did New Jersey Get Only Half as Much Sandy Aid as New York?

Why Did New Jersey Get Only Half as Much Sandy Aid as New York? (via NJSpotlight)

On April 29 of last year, six months to the day after Sandy made landfall, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie stood with U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan in a seafood restaurant in Highlands, NJ. Surrounded by cameras, Donovan…

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The List: Ten Ways Sandy’s Impact Continues to Be Felt At the Jersey Shore

The List: Ten Ways Sandy’s Impact Continues to Be Felt At the Jersey Shore (via NJSpotlight)

Kids are getting out of school, the weather is getting nicer, and many people are starting to flock to the Shore as they do each year around this time. Early indicators like pre-season beach tag sales and vacation rental bookings seem to point to a…

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Obama diverts $1 billion in Sandy funds away from New Jersey

Kyrillos and Holzapfel cry foul

Sen. Joe Kyrillos

President Barack Obama announced that he is diverting nearly $1 billion in Hurricane Sandy recovery funds away from New Jersey and New York to fund a nationwide resiliency competition that will ostensibly help the winning communities build infrastructure to deal with the impacts of climate change.

Obama announced the competition last weekend at the University of California Irvine’s commencement, according to The Star Ledger. 

“In some parts of the country, weather-related disasters like droughts and fires and storms and floods are going to get … harsher and they’re going to get costlier,” Obama said during the speech. “That’s why today I’m announcing a new one billion dollar competitive fund to help communities prepare for the impacts of climate change and build more resilient infrastructure across the country.”

State Senators Joe Kyrillos (R-Monmouth)and Jim Holzapfel (R-Ocean)l condemned the diversion of recovery funds away from their constituents.

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Sweeney in Sea Bright: “Republicans Shaming Themselves” Over Sandy Bill of Rights

Beck: “Hubris and Ego have no place in this recovery process. We have all made some mistakes. Now we need to fix them.”

Thomas P. Largey, 82, and Senate President Steve Sweeney talk in Largey’s gutted Sea Bright home prior to Sweeney’s press conference. May 30, 2014. Photo by Art Gallagher

Senate President Steve Sweeney held a politically charged press conference in a partially gutted Sea Bright home this morning, ostensibly to create political pressure on Republicans in the State Legislature to join Democrats in overriding Governor Chris Christie’s conditional veto of the Sandy Bill of Rights.

Sweeney’s comments sounded like a campaign rally against Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon, Senator Jennifer Beck and Senate Minority Leader Tom Kean, JR.

The “Sandy Bill of Rights” passed both houses of the State Legislature unanimously in March.  Christie conditionally vetoed the bill earlier this month, making over 150 changes to it.  Some of the changes were to bring the law into compliance with federal Housing and Urban Development regulations, others removed what Christie called “partisan language.”  One of Christie changes removed the requirement on the State that applicants for RREM grants be able to access the status of their applications online.

Sweeney penned an OpEd published in The Asbury Park Press last week wherein he appealed to Republican legislators who had unanimously voted for his bill “to do something they have yet to do under this (Christie) administration, and that’s to put aside their partisanship and override the governor’s veto.”

O’Scanlon responded with an OpEd of his own, wherein he said, “after further analysis we found a number of critical flaws that the Governor wisely and reasonably addresses in his conditional veto.”

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