Protect Our Coast NJ letter to Ocean City mayor, council, said Nov. 6 session dominated by outsiders
OCEAN CITY – Local residents, part of a group opposing the Ocean Wind project off the coast of the resort, want the Danish company planning the massive wind turbine farm to return to Ocean City and have a true question-and-answer session focused solely on the residents of the island.
Members of Protect Our Coast NJ wrote to Mayor Jay Gillian and Ocean City Council in a letter dated Nov. 16 and some of them spoke before council during public comment at Thursday night’s meeting. They highlighted points from the letter announcing their disappointment – disgust even – with Ørsted’s three-and-a-half-hour public forum Nov. 6 – and asked the administration to set up a new session.
A number of council members agreed with the commenters that the meeting that brought numerous representatives of Ørsted to the Music Pier that Saturday fell far short of expectations.
Councilman Jody Levchuk labeled the Ørsted session a “dog and pony show” and a “sales pitch” from Ørsted. He agreed with Councilman Keith Hartzell that most people walked out of the session disappointed. “We were disrespected,” Levchuk said.
Council President Bob Barr said he and Councilman Tomaso Rotondi – who criticized the project during Ørsted’s forum – called Ørsted the day after to voice their displeasure.
Barr called the forum “an absolute circus” and an “abomination” during which Ørsted stacked the room with supporters and “didn’t want to hear from our residents.”
“I got up and walked out because I was so upset,” Barr said.
Barr added that he will no longer communicate with Ørsted, saying the company doesn’t communicate in good faith and doesn’t operate in good faith. Noting he didn’t want to steal the administration’s thunder, he said the administration is going to bring something forward to deal with Ørsted but didn’t elaborate. “We’ll share more of that in the future,” he said.
The complaints from the citizens group letter were voiced during public comment.
Rick Birch, who said he lives in the Ocean City Homes neighborhood, watched the forum on YouTube and said those who participated felt frustrated and defeated.
Suzanne Hornick, of the OC Flooding Committee and a member of Protect Our Coast NJ, said the Ørsted forum “was an absolute disgrace.”
She criticized the fact a pro-wind group had a table handing out information outside the Music Pier while groups including Protect Our Coast NJ was not invited to do the same.
“When we got there we were disgusted we had to walk past a table full of propaganda,” she said. She said the forum featured so many speakers from outside the city, outside Cape May County and even outside New Jersey who were there to talk about the “joys” or “wonders” of the wind farm. She also noted former Gov. Jim Florio spoke, but wasn’t a stakeholder because he doesn’t have property in Ocean City. (Florio said he has property in Sea Isle City.)
She said the company “continues to provide half-truths, mistruths and complete misinformation.”
Hornick contended locals were not given the opportunity to stand up and ask questions and she had to wait until nearly two hours into the session before she was able to ask her questions.
The forum did allow questions from anyone who wanted to stand up and speak and took questions via Zoom but those who signed up in advance – many of them from business or labor groups – got to speak first.
Hornick said she and others were told they would not have to sign up in advance to speak.
She called for the city and company to get together for another forum “for the people of Ocean city, those who are collateral damage to the project.”
Resident Bill Hartranft said they want the forum to include representatives of not only Ørsted, but Ocean Wind partner PSEG, the state Board of Public Utilities and BOEM – the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.
According to the letter sent to mayor and council, the forum should include those representatives because they have not held any meetings with stakeholders and consistently avoid answer emailed questions. In addition, the new forum would not allow any statements of support or approval, ban space for groups lobbying for or against the project, and just take questions from residents.
As Hornick said, “we need to do something better and do it in a timely fashion.”
In the letter, the group said it doesn’t want a repeat of the Nov. 6 forum which “seemed, to many, to be an orchestrated 3 hour long infomercial in support of wind turbines off our coast. Many non-Ocean City groups and people representing unions, businesses and groups, some formed as recently as three days prior, and who have been financially supported by Ørsted were invited not just on Ocean Wind’s website to be there but also by the new Ørsted financially backed Coalition of Pro Wind known as NJ Wind Works.
“These groups were not from Ocean City, do not represent Ocean City, as far as we know they do not own property here or have members from Ocean City, yet they were given an opportunity to pontificate on the awesomeness of wind farms and completely discount our concerns that we are being forced to be collateral damage,” the letter reads in part. “Speakers from these groups took up much of the allotted time for questions which in turn took away from the local Ocean City folks being able to ask and get answers to our questions. So much so that people began to get angry as they realized these pro wind people from out of town seemed to be purposely taking time away from us and were being called on before locals who wanted to ask questions.”
– BY DAVID NAHAN/OCEAN CITY SENTINEL