Still building

Add Middlesex Borough officials to the list of those who’ve sorted through at least part of President Donald Trump’s blizzard of executive orders.

In particular, borough officials and the Green Brook Flood Control Commission sought word on the ongoing flood risk management project – more commonly referred to as the floodwall.

Funding for the project remains in place, officials said this week, despite the president’s order regarding a federal spending freeze and resulting confusion and speculation about its potential impact. A federal judge has issued a temporary stay, blocking the freeze’s implementation.

A memo from the The White House Office of Management became public on Monday, Jan. 27 outlining the intent of the freeze order Trump had signed the prior week. At the following night’s Borough Council meeting, officials said they were not concerned that flood wall funding was at risk. But they also acknowledged they did not yet have definitive word on the matter.

Raymond Murray, chairman of the flood commission’s executive board, gave that assurance the following day in response to an email from Middlesex Borough Council President Michael Conahan. Murray did not see cause for floodwall funding concern.

“We are confirming with our contacts at USACE (United States Army Corps of Engineers),” Murray wrote, “but, the memo and my conversation this morning with our lobbyist support my interpretation that this will in no way affect the ongoing work in Middlesex Borough, nor any of the other funding that has been directed for this project in the Disaster Relief funding that followed Tropical Storm Ida.

“This includes not only the $496 million for construction,” Murray added, “but also the $3 million allocated toward the upper basin re-evaluation study.”

Later in the day, Murray sent a followup email. “USACE just confirmed ‘as of today, there is no known impact to the funding or progress on the Green Brook project,’ “ Murray wrote on the afternoon of Wednesday, Jan. 29.

That afternoon, the floodwall job site looked much like the preceding days. Work crews in hardhats were busy doing various tasks to move construction along.

Speculation ran wild nationally early in the week on the possible fallout from a spending freeze. The Association of State Floodplain Managers, however, saw no reason for immediate alarm.

The association published an article on its web site stating that the Federal Flood Risk Management Standard (FFRMS) was still in effect pending other action. The FFRMS had been signed by President Joe Biden in 2021 and floodwall funding approval followed.

“As of right now, it’s (the association’s) understanding that both Federal Emergency Management Agency’s and Department of Housing and Urban Development’s rules for implementing the FFRMS are still in effect and will remain so until any potential rule-making is undertaken to undo it,” the association wrote on Jan. 21. The process of undoing the standard could take a year and involve litigation, the article added.

At the Middlesex Borough Council’s Tuesday, Jan. 28 meeting, the governing body was not worried by the situation when asked about it by Inside – Middlesex. Mayor Jack Mikolajczyk said that Department of Public Works supervisor Len Vidal has been in continual contact with the Army Corps.

Vidal said there had been talk of a hold on future floodwall purchase orders, but that already approved funding was not endangered.

“I haven’t seen any documentation that said anything to the contrary,” Mikolajczyk said when asked if floodwall work would continue.

Floodwall work has already cost the borough $900,000 in lost annual tax revenue due to property buyouts, the mayor said recently.

“Is there any concern? This is a project that’s been going on for 50 years,” Mikolajczyk said of the long-running Green Brook Flood Risk Management Project. “It’s probably going to be going on 50 years after I’m dead.”

“I’m not concerned about it at this point,” he added. “In terms of all the other fish that we have to fry, that one’s kind of far down the list.”

“If I have it right, I believe our financing for the flood project is secured,” Mikolajczyk said. “I would tend to think we’re far down the list of things they’re looking to yank at this point.”

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