I wrote this blog post ten years ago on this night, 10/28/2025, and am reproducing it from my diary. The simple fact is that our community never recovered. I am changed because of Sandy.
Superstorm Sandy changed my life; that is an understatement. As we approach the 3 year anniversary this week is becomes increasingly clear that many of the changes are not directly caused by the storm itself but by the human reactions transferred to physical response and government policy. The most obvious way to look at these changes is to break it down into components:
Insurance – My flood insurance claim and homeowners claims were denied. I lost the appeal of the homeowners claim (no coverage for wind damage). I hired an attorney to reopen the flood claim but I have no insight into the progress of that effort. If feels like being punched in the gut after paying these insurance premiums for so many years, listening to the advice of my insurance advisers, and then having them all turn their backs in this time of disaster. I now have a bad attitude about the insurance industry. (That is also an understatement).
Financial – The day before Sandy my bills were paid, I had a little money in the bank, a high credit score, a modest retirement account and cash value life insurance policy and substantial lines of available credit that I thought would sustain me through any rough spots in business. Today I have exhausted all financial resources, have defaulted on some borrowing accounts and face tax lien foreclosure. My income for 2015 is perhaps half of what it was in 2012. Sandy did not just affect my NJ shore business. It also affected my Pennsylvania-based accounting business. There are only so many hours in the week and additional necessary time demands on recovery efforts took away from my other business.
Real estate – Properties in my community are worth about 1/3 of what they were a decade ago. That is due mostly to sea level rise and not to Sandy but certainly Sandy hastened the crash. This is a problem for me since most of my remaining net worth is in real estate. Meanwhile taxes continue to rise. The combined effect of falling values and rising taxes means that I pay about 15% of property value in real estate taxes every year. As far as I can tell, that rate is among the highest in the country!
Disaster relief – I listened to Governor Christie when he went on TV and effectively said ‘Go ahead and make necessary repairs. Get your businesses open again. We’ll worry about the paperwork later’. Silly me. I’m paying dearly for listening to that advice. Everyone, including the aid officers agrees that “disaster relief was a disaster”. I’ve lost track of the number of aid applications and tremendous number of hours providing required documentation. I joke that if I took a side job at $10 per hour I might be better off financially compared to the return on time invested in disaster relief applications. A few months ago NOAA, a federal agency, came through with a grant of $8400 to keep our commercial fishery business from closing. I was especially disappointed that all SBA applications were denied.
Government prosecutions – In the 27 years before Sandy I did not face a single government complaint. This includes federal, state, county and local government entities. Since Sandy the NJDEP has issued multiple property liens for my tidelands lease violations, Downe Township attempted tax lien foreclosure, my state building permits were all declined, the state building inspector issued fines for making post-storm repairs without a building permit, Cumberland County Health Department issued Notices of Violation for pre-existing water and septic violations, DEP issued multiple Notices of Violation for a range of pre-existing conditions, NJDEP declined my waterfront development application and then declined my application for exemption for waterfront development, the NJ Department of Community Affairs prosecuted me for late payment of a business permit (with a 100% penalty) then most recently Downe Township attempted to prosecute me for lack of a Certificate of Occupancy. I’m not saying that the government’s individual actions were without merit. I am saying that it is ridiculous to presume that any property owner could deal with this onslaught of new government demands in a “down and out” status left by the wake of Sandy. Certainly we all want to live in a society defined by compliance with government standards. But it is unconscionable to prosecute property owners who are doing their best under these extreme circumstances. I emphasize that most of these problems existed for decades before I even came onto the scene and it is unreasonable to demand that I fix them all immediately.
Marriage and family – Marriage, for me, has never been easy. Since Sandy, marriage has been on life support. I’ve missed most family activities in the last three years. In fact in the first 14 months after the storm I took only two days off. Otherwise it was 14 hour/7 day work weeks focused on rebuilding the business. I’m working on it, but as I said, I’m not an expert on the topic of healthy relationships.
Friends and community – I still get emotional when I think of the friends I used to see daily – those that were part of my comfortable daily routine – but haven’t been seen since Sandy. I can see that the incidence of mental illness has increased in my community. The level of hostility among neighbors is increased, families are breaking up at a faster pace and the anti-government attitudes I observe are at near revolt level. I don’t share these hostile feelings; frankly I am too wrapped up in just keeping my life together.
Mental and physical health – They say stress kills. I think about this often now. I’ve gained weight. I exercise less often. I rarely get to participate in the activities I used to enjoy before Sandy. I am aware of the need to return to a balanced life but the ongoing demands and daily treats indicate that it may take years before I can relive this stress. Online discussions of “Post Sandy Distress Order” make me realize that I’m not the only one.
Media coverage – I have often been in the news; it’s part of my shtick. But the number of interviews and articles since Sandy. Unfortunately some have positioned my strategic retreat approach against my neighbors’ “no retreat” for the sake of sensationalism. We don’t need that extra outside tension.
Politics – I was not involved in politics before Sandy except for financial support of a few local candidates. A post-Sandy “brain trust” assembled to advise my business concluded that the only viable path to sustainability of the business was though a political channels. I adopted a political response strategy and it has been effective. I won’t embarrass the many political figures who have helped me in the midst of this rant.
So where am I now? I feel that my future is largely in the hands of government and the legal system. This is not to say that I do not recognize the fact that my own actions largely determine my future. I think about the three realms of possibility: 1) things that matter, 2) things I can control, and 3) the overlapping realm of things that I should focus on. I just can’t seem to make a reasonable prediction of what will happen to my business and my community in the years ahead. It remains difficult to plan a fulfilling life under these circumstances.
The physical impact of the storm is mostly history now. But the combined effects of piled storm recovery debt and government reactions could put me out of business and might even completely erase my community from the map. Bankruptcy and divorce remain constant risks. I am coping but certainly wish that I didn’t have to deal with it.
Tony Novak
Nantuxent Group