Christie Pledges Support for Fire-Ravaged Towns

Mr. Christie spoke with dozens of people who lost their businesses in a devastating fire two days ago along a famous stretch of Boardwalk in Seaside Heights and Seaside Park, pledging the full support of the state to help them rebuild yet again. Later on Saturday, Mr. Christie announced an initial aid package of $15 million for businesses damaged in the fire.

“I wouldn’t be anyplace else,” Mr. Christie said at the Boardwalk. “This is what this job is all about. When a crisis happens, you have to be here to help organize things, to lend encouragement and deliver help.”

Even as Mr. Christie met with residents to discuss recovery, small hot spots remained, including a minor flare-up before dawn on Saturday that firefighters had to put down.

The conditions complicated the task of investigators who were still trying to pinpoint exactly where the fire started and what triggered it. Despite a variety of reports circulating in different media outlets and speculation by residents, Al Della Fave, a spokesman for the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office, said the case was still under investigation.

“There’s still no determination on cause,” he said in a statement. “No one at the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office has labeled the fire suspicious. Our only comment is that the investigation continues.”

In addition to investigators from the state fire marshal’s office and the New Jersey State Police, representatives of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were also at the site on Saturday.

William Rumbolo, the chief of the Seaside Heights Volunteer Fire Department, said he had spoken to investigators who told him that they were looking at all possibilities.

He said that the damage could have been worse if the fire had started a day later, when many of the firefighters in the two towns were scheduled to be at a convention in Wildwood, N.J., about 90 miles away.

“I would say 80 percent of the towns around us, including ourselves, would not have had the manpower, because it’s a statewide convention,” Mr. Rumbolo said.

Mr. Christie also said the damage could have been much worse, if not for the efforts of more than 400 firefighters who blocked the fire from spreading up the Boardwalk by twice digging trenches to cut it off.

“We were 30 to 40 minutes away, if cutting the trench didn’t work, of losing the whole Boardwalk,” he said.

When Mr. Christie arrived on the Boardwalk, he was treated more like a matinee idol than a politician as throngs of well-wishers crowded around him — most more interested in posing for photographs than in asking about the fire.

It took him an hour to walk one block.

But some business owners, frustrated by the slow delivery of assistance after Hurricane Sandy, were hoping the process would be smoother this time.

Bob Stewart, the owner of the Carousel Arcade, which was badly damaged in the fire, who is also a volunteer fireman who was one of the first to reach the scene, said the governor in a meeting had promised to speed things along.

“Time is everything here,” Mr. Stewart said. “Next summer comes before you know it. We’ve had a bad summer this summer, and we have to be ready for next summer. Or we’ll have another bad year.”

When Mr. Christie stopped to talk to reporters, he reiterated his promise that the state’s assistance would start flowing soon. “It is not our first time at the rodeo,” he said, noting that one of the few benefits of Hurricane Sandy was that it helped prepare the state to better deal with disasters.

“We had two days to feel sad about this, and it is legitimately a sad thing,” he said. “But we’ve got work to do now.”