Here is a comment from Tomas which we received today.
“Ocean Grove is privately owned by a religously affiliated organization and it is historically strongly Republican. FEMA’s actions are entirely understandable in this context.”
There also were others that speculated (with no evidence whatsoever) that FEMA was biased against Ocean Grove either because of our “Republican” political profile or because FEMA dislikes the CMA’s religious views and history of “discrimination” against gays. They simply don’t buy the idea that FEMA ruled on this application based only on their regulations.
Aside from Tomas’ ignorance revealed when he says that Ocean Grove is privately owned, he also is misinformed about our political history. Neptune is a heavily Democratic town in a Republican county. Ocean Grove has voted for the last four Democratic presidential candidates including Obama over Romney in 2012. In addition Ocean Grove majorities voted for the Democratic candidates for Senate, House, etc, across the board in 2012.
Charles Layton wrote an article about that election which is linked below.
If we are to have any hope of reversing this decision, we need to stick to the facts. If someone has evidence of bias on the part of FEMA, then they need to come forward, but we will not post comments that are accusing anyone of bias without evidence. This is a violation of our longstanding rules on Blogfinger.
By Paul Goldfinger, editor
NOTE: Here is a link to another Asbury Park Press article posted today regarding the FEMA denial: