I assure you, I believe that competent adults my make their own decisions about protecting and staying on their property as long as they take consequences without throwing the burden, risk and cost of solving the consequences on the public.
We must be aware that when doing so we create a climate where others, less competent, less prepared or less qualified, follow our example. We saw terrible results from this in Katrina. They thought of themselves as qualified low-land people as well.
If 20 people had elected to stay, I would not have even noted a weather person’s comments. 200 from such a small island seems like capricious behavior to me. That is just my personal opinion. Others will have opinions of their own.
A quarter of the population remaining to me is more persuasive that these people needed to stay for a variety of reasons. Animals. Their boats. They’ve been through countless storms there. This is not a place filled with people living off of welfare. They made the call, there is no real hospital there. They’re on their own and they know it. They’ve always been pretty much on their own, it’s an island, no bridges. Ferry service shuts down, they’re not getting anything off that island but perhaps themselves in private vessels. Easy for you to judge, sitting high and dry. It’s their call to make.