Facing her first winter storm days into the job, New Jersey’s new governor leaned on preparation, visibility, and nonstop communication.
After the cannon blasts outside the New Jersey PAC celebrated Mikie Sherrill’s inauguration last week, she faced a test – a snow storm was heading to New Jersey.
Older residents may recall when storms were not necessarily political events. People expected snow in the winter and they dealt with it.
Things have changed, perhaps because of the 24-hour news cycle and social media. Now, elected officials – like a governor – are expected to prepare for the worst and to have a plan of action.
Many governors have discovered that the hard way.
Back in Phil Murphy’s first year in office in November, 2018, an early ice storm caught the state unprepared and clogged traffic for hours.
About eight years before that, then Gov. Chris Christie, also in year one of his term, was in Disney World in Florida when a December blizzard hit the state. He, infamously, refused to come home early. In fairness, it must be noted that he certainly redeemed himself after Sandy hit the state in 2012.
Sherrill, quite obviously, knew the recent history. Which is why she talked about meeting with emergency personnel to prepare for the storm the day she took office.
At this point, we must state that what a governor can do is limited. If a bad storm is going to come, it is going to come.
A governor can make sure the state takes care of its roads, which are basically our major highways. Most secondary and municipal roads are the responsibility of counties and towns, not the state. The state can ensure, however, that local road crews have enough salt and other material.
A governor can also do something else – communicate with the public about current conditions. By any objective look, Sherrill did that quite well.
On Sunday, the day snow began falling, Sherrill made about 20 – yes 20 – appearances on local media outlets to talk about conditions at the time. This included outlets in New Jersey, New York and Philadelphia, in addition to national cable stations like CNN and MS NOW.
On Sunday, she also visited highway maintenance areas or “storm preparation sites” on the Turnpike and Parkway.
The governor continued her round of media appearances Monday morning when she spoke to six outlets between 7 and 9 a.m.
These were not lengthy speeches, but simple updates about the latest forecast and road conditions at the time in various sections of the state.
On the governor’s social media page, there were many favorable comments about her performance, although there were a few stale jokes about flying helicopters. One can probably expect those jokes to be around as long as Sherrill is in public office.
Later on Monday, Sherrill held a briefing with relevant state officials – State Police Acting Superintendent Lieutenant Colonel David Sierotowicz, Joseph Bertoni, the Department of Transportation Acting Commissioner, and Kris Kolluri, NJ TRANSIT President and CEO.
She reported that the clean-up was still on, but that all major highways in the state were cleared down “to the blacktop.”
When it was time for questions from the press, there were far and few between, prompting Sherrill to quip that was because we did such a “thorough” job.
Or maybe reporters were “questioned out?”
Still, by the standards of recent governors and winter storms, you have to give Sherrill good grades.
By William Swanson, Special to The Central Observer