FROM SETH GROSSMAN INTERVIEW ON HARRY HURLEY RADIO PROGRAM: WPG Talk Radio 95.5 FM and 1450AM near Atlantic City on September 30, 2026 Harry Hurley: All right, citizen Seth Grossman is here, because while everybody's thinking that the flooding happens because of the ocean, there are those who believe it's happening at the back bay. So that the bulkheads, not the dunes, are your more rightful protection, if you will. Seth Grossman: People who say that sand dunes protected Atlantic City and Margate from more severe flooding during the storm last weekend remind me of my Dad telling me about when he was stationed in Atlantic City for a few weeks during the early days of World War II. He told me he had to guard the boiler room of the St. Charles Hotel at New Jersey Avenue and the Boardwalk with a wooden rifle. My Dad told me that in 1942, the army did not have enough real rifles to go around. So I said, "Dad, Why did they give you a wooden rifle? What good was it?" My Dad smiled and said, "It worked just fine! The Germans never came near the place!" I think of my Dad's wooden rifle when people tell me how we needed sand dunes to protect beach towns like Atlantic City and Margate from ocean flooding last weekend. Let's start by talking about how we those wooden bulkheads and concrete seawalls along the beach and Boardwalk from the Inlet in Atlantic City all the way down to Longport. Above Image: Margate, NJ Beach and Elephant Shortly After 1944 Hurricane. In 1944, we had a devastating hurricane in Atlantic City. It wiped out the old Heinz Pier, the Margate Boardwalk, and it did a lot of damage all over the island. Harry Hurley: Yep. Seth Grossman: And in response to that, Atlantic City—with no federal aid, and no state aid other than money from a new local luxury tax--built those wooden bulkheads and concrete seawalls all along the Boardwalk. And of course, it wasn't just that Hurricane of 1944. Before that, the old-timers would talk about the northeaster of 1938, which knocked out the Brigantine Bridge. That is how a guy called Captain Starn made a fortune taking people back and forth from Brigantine. And that's how he got the money to do a lot of his improvements at the Captain Starn's Restaurant that a lot of us Boomers went to growing up. Above Image: Margate NJ Beach and Elephant Shortly After "Superstorm Sandy" in 2012. There were no sand dunes at the time and little, if any flooding from the ocean. We grew up with those wooden bulkheads all along the ocean; they were normal. And in some street ends, you actually had concrete seawalls. That wooden bulkhead stopped basically the water from coming up from the ocean in 1962. Almost all the flooding came from the back bay. And we went through this with Hurricane Sandy in 2012. When you look at the photographs, you'll see right by the Margate elephant, that same wooden bulkhead that was built in Atlantic City by the Boardwalk was also built through Ventnor, Margate, and Longport. And that bulkhead, during Hurricane Sandy 2012, stopped the flooding. Host: We went away from what worked, and we put something in that doesn't work. Seth Grossman: Yes. And you don't have to be an expert in engineering to watch how waves break on the beach during ocean storms. When you had a wide, flat beach, you would see that the waves would break 50 yards away from where the bulkhead was, and just the water would come up, and the bulkhead would stop the water. If you look at the photographs of the Margate elephant, you'll see that the wooden bulkheads stopped the water, and the only flooding that took place during Sandy down in this area was from the back bay. So why did we get in with this nonsense with the sand dunes? I was on City Council in Atlantic City during the 1980s when the nonsense started. Later, as a private lawyer, I represented the owner of one of the piers in Atlantic City. At that time, officials from Federal Emergency Management and the State Department of Environmental Protection were trying to get the owners of oceanfront properties into giving them easements. They wanted these beach front property owners to basically turn their rights to the beach over to the Army Corps of Engineers. This was insanity. Who would want the government to block their view of the ocean and pleasant sea breezes with ugly piles of sand! And then I realized what the whole dune thing was about. It was like a marriage of convenience between some very crazy people and some very corrupt people. First, you had these woke environmentalists who didn't want humans, especially wealthy, successful humans to enjoy ocean views and sea breezes, and luxury lifestyles. They wanted nobody on the beach but nature. If they had their way, the only creatures on the beach would be seagulls, piping plovers, greenheads, mosquitos and other natural wildlife. Of course, these woke environmentalists were also hypocrites. They also wanted so-called "public access" so that homeless bums could ...
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