Taken to a Vietnam war protest when she was 10 left lasting impression; she knew that education was key to her future
By CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff
Atlantic County Commissioner Caren Fitzpatrick said the culture of the 1970s had a profound influence on her life journey.
Her father, Martin Sollish, was a Korean War veteran and philosophy professor at Atlantic Cape Community College who took her to her first anti-war demonstration.
“That definitely influenced me — I was 10 years old when my father took me to my first Vietnam war protest,” she said. “When we started bombing Cambodia there was a protest in Atlantic City and he took me out of school. He thought it was important for me to know about these social issues and to learn about what our government was doing.”
Her mother, on the other hand, was not as politically active and “thought that he was taking my childhood.”
“I’m grateful that he opened my eyes to those issues and allowed me to observe,” she said.
Fitzpatrick recently began her second term as one of four at-large members on the nine-member Board of Commissioners. She was elected in 2017 to her first three-year term and won a second term in 2020.
Fitzpatrick was a member of the choir, science club, Spanish club and French club at Mainland Regional High School and believes her experiences walking the halls there affected her way of thinking.
“I think that at that time the teachers that I had allowed us to explore. We were given basically a liberal arts education at Mainland with teachers who made learning fun and allowed us to explore beyond our little area through music and art and science, to dig deeper beyond what we had grown up with in elementary school or even in our own private homes. We had a great faculty when I was at Mainland,” she said.
Fitzpatrick left high school after her junior year and attended the University of Delaware for three semesters before moving back to the area to work, but the job prospects in Atlantic City were few and far between. At the time, the resort’s glory days were well in the past and “it was quite desolate,” Fitzpatrick said.
She said it was very difficult to find a job, so she moved to Philadelphia with her boyfriend. They returned to the area in 1980 to run her husband’s family’s deli, Fitzpatrick’s in Somers Point.
At the same time, casino gaming had just been approved, promising hope for a brighter future in southern New Jersey. Despite having plenty to do at the deli, Fitzpatrick took a job as a cocktail waitress at the first casino, Tropicana Casino and Resort, in 1981 for the medical benefits. The family eventually sold the restaurant in 1989 and it now is located on Route 9 where Sullivan’s bar was for so long.
Fitzpatrick got married and started a family, but eventually realized the need for further education.
“I knew I had to get an education if I wanted to accomplish what I envisioned my life to be,” she said, noting her vision included being able to help provide for her family and live a full life. “Education is very important to me.”
Fitzpatrick started taking classes at Atlantic Cape Community College, where she earned an associate degree in accounting in 1995. She later earned a bachelor’s degree in administration from Thomas Edison State College and a master’s degree in business administration from Stockton University.
Fitzpatrick now is director of finance and administration at Meet AC, the sales and marketing force that supports the Atlantic City Convention Center.
She said casinos were a positive step in the right direction for southern New Jersey because “there was nothing else, no industry at all,” and she still believes so.
“It’s the biggest industry that we have. It’s unfortunate that it’s the most volatile. It’s so dependent on the economy and disposable income. We need more substantial industries like the pharmaceutical manufacturing company that opened up in Buena and the airport support that’s going on out in Pomona and Egg Harbor Township. We need all of those things but we need them to grow,” she said.
Fitzpatrick said tourism is a big industry across the country and around the world but thinks area leaders were short-sighted by promoting only the casinos and not growing other industries or offerings.
Through the 1980s, ’90s and the first decade of the 21st century, casinos wanted to pack their houses and keep their customers there, so they hid the ocean and boardwalk away behind walls where no clocks hung.
“As business owners and competitors, they want their business to be the most successful. Unfortunately that model didn’t work very well for our community and just now, all these years later, we are just starting to see marketing of Atlantic City as a destination, again with other attractions besides casino gambling,” she said.
Fitzpatrick said the entertainment that Atlantic City attracts is really popular, offering something people can do besides gamble. She also cited recreational offerings such as the many golf courses in the area and ecotourism.
“We are starting to branch out and have a lot more things for people to do, and I think a lot of that has to do with younger people coming to Atlantic City. It’s not the same destination that it was in the ’70s,” she said. “Younger people are bringing some new interesting ideas — the axe-throwing place in Atlantic City, Little River Distillery, we have the Orange Loop which is developed by young entrepreneurs. Making Atlantic City attractive for those kinds of outside-the-box thinkers is really important,” she said.
Fitzpatrick, who belongs to a couple of national tourism industry groups, said she is trying to promote her ideas on the county governing body.
“Their counties all over the country contribute to the tourism industry directly and Atlantic County does not do that. I think it’s important that the county should partner with the biggest industry that we have and the biggest employer that we have,” Fitzpatrick said.
She said there is a symbiotic relationship between tourism and the county.
“If the industry flourishes the county flourishes because people make money and can afford to live here,” she said. “It’s a partnership. It’s a relationship that grows or shrinks together.”
It’s interesting to note that Fitzpatrick worked for the first casino when it opened and now works to promote the resort.
“I’m in a unique position where I worked on the front line in one of the casino hotels, I’ve been a small-business owner in the county, I’ve raised my family here and now I’m in a position in an organization that helps promote the destination that I love,” she said. “Atlantic City is my home and I care for it and I want to see it grow and succeed as well as the other people who live here. We live in a really special place and the people here work hard and they deserve a good standard of living for their hard work. In my little capacity at Meet AC maybe I am able to help that a little bit by having some ideas and knowing people who can put them into action and move us all forward.”
Fitzpatrick turned out to be the only Democrat among the four county commissioners who graduated from Mainland Regional.
“I think in our area where we live, it’s very mixed politically but when you get down to hometown issues I think we can agree on a lot,” she said.
Fitzpatrick said she thinks party politics at the local level are important to effecting change on a larger scale rather than the other way around.
“I think that our national leaders and our state leaders have to listen to what the people at the municipal level are saying and make their decisions based on that,” she said. “When we organize and communicate with leaders, that’s how we make social change. If we didn’t do that you wouldn’t have a civil rights movement.”
She believes in grass-roots movements at the local level setting the tone for policy.
“My philosophy in a nutshell is that leadership should listen to people on the ground telling them what they need and want rather than leadership telling people what they need,” Fitzpatrick said.
A feminist, she supports all people having an equal voice in their lives.
“We all prosper when we have a variety of opinions and thoughts regarding the decisions we make, and everybody brings something unique to the table,” she said.
