SOMERS POINT — “I am extremely happy that we are going to have Bayfest on April 29,” Mayor Jack Glasser said March 9. “Bayfest is like the Good Old Days (festival), it really makes Somers Point shine. I just couldn’t see Somers Point not having it.”
Started in 1989 to coincide with Earth Day and celebrate the city’s maritime heritage, Bayfest has become the city’s most popular event, in the past drawing more than 30,000 people to historic Bay Avenue in late April.
Food and craft vendors and nonprofit environmental organizations will line the street between Pleasure and Annie avenues along Great Egg Harbor Bay, where the crowd can enjoy live music and theater performances, games and children’s activities from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, April 29.
The festival, a popular draw for both locals and visitors, has a good history of dry weather and enjoyed a good run until COVID-19 became a pandemic just weeks before the 2020 event. It was canceled that year and in 2021 but returned in 2022.
Council President Janice Johnston said she had attended a Bayfest Committee meeting last week and “they were very, very organized and I think it’s going to be a great event.”
The committee is looking for crafters, food vendors, children’s activity providers and environmental exhibitors to participate. All applications are due by April 3. Find out more at visitsomerspoint.com or email amathers@spgov.org for more information.
War of 1812 monument
Mayor Jack Glasser said he met with two students from Atlantic County Institute of Technology who will be designing a refurbished War of 1812 monument for the city.
Glasser and a couple of other military veterans have been discussing what could be done to improve the monument, which was erected in 1923 at New Jersey Avenue by the Century Chapter National Society United States Daughters of 1812 as a tribute to the volunteers who built and defended the sand fort there from 1812-15.
The sand fort was built by local militia members to protect Great Egg Harbor River when Mays Landing was a hub of shipping for the area.
The mayor, who works as a security guard at ACIT, has arranged for students in city resident Drew Holmes’ computer-aided design class to submit ideas to the Veterans Advisory Board for approval. The plan eventually would need City Council’s blessing.
“I spent about an hour with them this week discussing what our ideas were and I tasked them with coming up with a great design, which I know they will,” Glasser said.
Intersection upgrades
Business Administrator Jason Frost reported meeting with representatives of Atlantic County and Linwood last week to discuss proposed safety improvements on Ocean Heights Avenue at the intersection with the bike path.
“The idea was to get all the stakeholders together — Ocean Heights is a county road, the one side is Somers Point and the other side in Linwood,” he said, noting two tragic accidents that happened there.
He said there are plans to make the area safer.
“We got an update in terms of what everyone has plans to do,” he said, noting plans were in the works before the accidents.
“It does look like those things are going to come in the 2023 calendar year,” Frost said.
Executive session
Council members met in executive session at the end of the meeting to discuss the status of legal and procedural issues pertaining to the plan for development of properties located at 900 and 901 Somers Point-Mays Landing Road, including the provisions for affordable housing obligations, a court-approved settlement agreement and the city’s housing plan. A second issue expected to be discussed was terms and conditions of an agreement among the city, R2F2 and a homeowners association regarding vacation of part of Oak Lane in the subject area.
By CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff