Heights Making Preparations For Hurricane Irene

The borough’s emergency management personnel are taking steps this week to make sure all is ready to go if any emergencies were to occur should Hurricane Irene threaten the north Jersey area in the coming days.

According to the National Weather Service, heavy rain and strong winds may hit the Hasbrouck Heights area Saturday and Sunday as a result of the storm which according to Weather.com is already a Category 3 storm.    

Police Chief Michael Colaneri said he is continuously updated by the county office of emergency management regarding the status of the storm.  Reports are coming in  that the storm may head out to sea before it would reach this area and hopefully that will be the case, he said.

However it’s best to be prepared, therefore Colaneri and members of the will  meet with department heads of the and along with borough administrators on Thursday to make sure all departments have everything they would need in the event of an emergency.

Fortunately the borough is at a higher elevation and therefore flooding doesn’t become too much of a problem however Colaneri said the biggest problems they have dealt with from severe storms is downed trees and wires. He referred to the two-day Nor'Easter storm March 2010 which took down about 40 trees throughout the borough.  In addition he has seen things like Route 17 at Williams Avenue flood and many residents experience basement flooding caused by severe storms. 

The borough has an action plan in place to provide shelter for residents if such a need were to ever come about, Colaneri said.  The senior center in the municipal building would be a good short term location, he said, as emergency management is run out of the same building and the center has a kitchen for food preparations.

If there was ever need to shelter a large number of people during an emergency, Colaneri said the high school would likely be suggested as a place were cots could be set up. All types of situations could occur such as people in the area getting stranded due to flooded roads for example.

In most cases if a family ever needs to vacate their home due to an unsafe condition caused by damage or loss of power the borough can make arrangements with the or the , both located in the borough.