Vicki Palmer, manager of the Ocean Plaza and Ocean View inns, takes another call from someone needing lodging. Photo by Mary Walton

By Mary Walton

Hurricane Sandy has proved an unexpected bonanza for the economy of Ocean Grove, filling hotels to capacity with displaced flood victims, government workers and private contractors, while boosting house rentals during the normally dormant winter season.

“Most of the inns are full and they do have waiting lists,” said Lois Hetfield, administrator of the Ocean Grove Chamber of Commerce.

The first to arrive were electrical crews from as far away as Michigan and Ohio, who “were pitching in to get the power back on,” said Vicki Palmer, manager of the Ocean Plaza and the Ocean View inns on the Pathway. With power largely restored in Monmouth County, “They left Monday.” But meanwhile a wave of inspectors from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) came in, “here to do inspections on homes.”

At the same time, FEMA launched a website that listed hotels approved for temporary housing of storm victims. Said Palmer, “We signed up with FEMA to be on their website and house displaced families. So did the Albatross, the Quaker Inn and the Majestic. Then the phones started ringing off the hook. There are so many people looking for places to stay and not enough rooms.”

She immediately canceled vacation reservations from other customers. “We explained that housing individuals and first responders was our number one priority.”

Her FEMA families currently include a mother with four small children, a couple with a special needs child and an elderly Monmouth Beach woman who lost her home and all her possessions. She welcomes the surge in business but feels sorry for the storm victims. “Unfortunately it’s on the backs of these people. You hate to even discuss it.”

The latest to arrive are several dozen members of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Some are lodged in the two Ocean Pathway inns managed by Palmer. Others are at the Shawmont Hotel at 17 Ocean Avenue, where they have rented most of the 28 rooms. Manager Joanna Bednarek said they are ideal customers. “They leave by six or seven in the morning and they don’t get back till nine. It’s unbelievable the hours they put in, and they work seven days a week.

“They’re an amazing group of people. So well-behaved. And they are gone all day so there are no complaints, no noise.”

With the government picking up the tab, cost does not seem to be an issue.  The Shawmont’s daily rates run from $85 to $105 during the week and $130 on weekends. If there are people who can’t afford them, “we’re willing to work with them,” Bednarek said.

At the Melrose, owned by Neptune Mayor Randy Bishop and Dan Margo, seven of the 10 rooms have been rented by FEMA for its relief employees. Because many of them have to be at work at out-of-town locations by 7 a.m., Margo said the Melrose, at 34 Seaview Avenue, offers a full breakfast at 5 a.m. The FEMA people, he said, were astonished to learn that “the guy serving breakfast in the morning is the mayor of a town of 40,000.”

Bishop and Margo do all the cooking and cleaning, but inns that depend on hired workers have been caught short. “It’s a problem at all the inns,” said Palmer. “In the summer, when we have the volume, we are staffed with high school and college kids.” She has had to take on cleaning chores.

Elsewhere in town winter rentals have been snapped up by displaced families and contractors, and the need is likely to grow as FEMA funding for temporary housing comes to an end. The original deadline was November 15, but Palmer said she has received extensions to Nov. 28. Rentals are also in demand by companies that are moving in work crews.

“Places are going quickly,” said Janet Manni of Century 21, where between 8 and 10 renters have snapped up properties in the Grove. Many owners of houses and apartments are reluctant to rent, knowing that they will want to ask renters to leave by June 1 when the summer season begins. “I think it would be very hard to put people out,” Manni said.

“We probably have eight inquiries a day,” said Angela Holder, the broker manager at Jack Green Realty.  She said they were contacting people with summer rentals to see if they can make them available now, and have also leased out several houses that were for sale. “We’re doing everything we can to help, but it’s hard finding the match. A lot of people have pets. Some people will take a small dog, but we have people with two big dogs or three small dogs. That’s the biggest problem we’ve run into.”