Topics include boardwalk hotels, wind farms, beach curfew
Editor’s note: See related main story on the Ocean City Council Candidate Forum.
OCEAN CITY — Nine candidates seeking five positions on City Council weighed in on boardwalk hotels, wind farms and the beach curfew during the lightning round of a Candidates Forum on April 29 hosted by the Ocean City Sentinel.
The lightning round provided each candidate for the four wards and an at-large position 30 seconds to answer a range of questions.
In the election May 14, voters will choose between Sean Barnes and Michael DeVlieger for the at-large seat, Keith Hartzell and Paul Stryker in the Second Ward, incumbent Jody Levchuk and Amie Vaules in the Third Ward and incumbent David Winslow and Cecelia Gallelli-Keyes in the Fourth Ward. Councilman Terry Crowley Jr. is running unopposed in the First Ward.
Boardwalk hotels
Moderator David Nahan, editor of the Ocean City Sentinel, asked candidates if they would support development of a hotel on the boardwalk.
Developer Eustace Mita, who rescued Mayor Jay Gillian’s Wonderland Pier by buying the amusement park property at Sixth Street and the Boardwalk after banks called in nearly $8 million in loans, delivered a lengthy conceptual presentation about building a luxury hotel during a City Council meeting in winter 2023.
Rather than replace the amusement park, which some had feared had been Mita’s plan for acquiring the amusement park property, he proposed buying the open city-owned land next door — bordered by Fifth and Sixth streets, the boardwalk and the parking lot for the Civic Center and Carey Field. That plot now has sand dunes and beach volleyball courts.
During the previous spring’s mayoral campaign, Hartzell ran on a platform that focused largely on fighting the concept of new high-rise hotels on the boardwalk.
During the campaign, Gillian said he had no plans to build a hotel and that Mita had partnered with him to save the amusement park that has been in his family for three generations but had fallen on hard times aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Absolutely not,” Barnes stated simply.
DeVlieger said there is no way he would vote for it.
“There are improvements we can do on the boardwalk but I believe in having the bookends of the rides, and some balance in what’s constructed on the boardwalk is also critical for maintaining the great things we have there,” he said.
Crowley said he would not support it but said there is an opportunity to work with a developer for a hotel in a different part of the city.
“As the island has increased our year-round population, the shoulder seasons are much busier than they used to be,” he said. “We are in need of a new hotel in town.”
Stryker said it’s a non-issue.
“From what I understand, it would be a near impossibility for it to happen,” he said.
Using an old cliche, Hartzell said, “if it’s not broke, don’t fix it.”
“The boardwalk is one of our crown jewels,” he said. “We’re America’s Greatest Family Resort and the tradition is a family vacation. To have any kind of boardwalk development with hotels would take away from the businesses up there.”
Vaules said she would vote no.
“I believe currently there is a law that you cannot build a high-rise on the boardwalk and I don’t know of anyone who is saying or would want to do that,” she said.
“I absolutely know somebody who is thinking about doing that,” Levchuk responded, saying he is open to hearing any idea.
“The responsible thing for me to do as an elected official is to be open, listen to what people would want to invest in in our community,” he said, adding that he would be against something of the scale proposed by Mita.
Gallelli-Keyes, whose family long owned the Tahiti Inn at 12th Street, said the city needs to maintain the hotels it has amid the conversion of many to condominiums.
“We don’t need a new hotel, we need the hotels to stay a hotel and keep the rooms open, not bigger facilities,” she said.
Winslow said hotel development on the boardwalk is not a permitted use.
“Any changes would have to be approved by council and while I am on council, I would never approve that,” he said.
Wind farms
The next question dealt with the development of offshore wind farms. Wind power generator Ørsted proposed the construction of hundreds of wind turbines off the coast of Atlantic and Cape May counties but ultimately abandoned its plans amid escalating costs and pushback from the public and local governments.
However, the Danish company still own rights to the development area and approval for the project and could choose to move forward on development.
The candidates were unanimously against offshore wind farms, with Vaules saying the community must remain “diligent.”
Hartzell said that if not for the efforts of DeVlieger, who conducted research and posed questions to officials from the company who were presenting the proposal to City Council, the skyline may look different today.
“So many things just didn’t make sense,” he said.
He also said the real fight is to regain home rule. The Legislature fast-tracked a measure that took the power to decide whether a utility could use a city’s right of way from municipalities and gave it to the Board of Public Utilities.
Crowley said City Council has decided to seek litigation to try to regain home rule, also warning that the issue could return in the future.
“We won this round but the leases are still there, there’s still the probability of someone buying it,” he said. “I don’t know what’s in it for you, I don’t know what’s in it for me and I don’t know what’s in it for Ocean City, so I am a hard no.”
Stryker said there are alternative energy sources that are a lot cleaner and better and should be investigated.
DeVlieger, who kept a miniature windmill next to his spot on the dais when he was on council to indicate his opposition, said officials from Ørsted “would not or could not” answer simple questions about the effects of the wind farms.
He said it is critical to re-establish home rule so that city can decide what takes place beneath its road.
“It’s setting a precedent that if the governor or the Legislature wants to jam something down our throat, the door is now open,” he said. “We need to fight this with everything we have.”
Barnes said he does not believe it is green energy.
“There is nothing about the industrialization of our ocean that is green,” he said.
Curfew on beach
Another question dealt with whether the city should maintain the 8 p.m. curfew on the beach. The city instituted the curfew, along with a ban on backpacks on the boardwalk, following two summers during which mobs of unruly teens gathered on the beaches to party.
“We saw what happened when we did not have that curfew: guns, knives, drugs,” Winslow said.
The situation arose after the state changed the way law enforcement could interact with youths following the legalization of marijuana.
Everyone agreed it should stay, with some commending officials for taking steps to end the behavior.
“I think the swift action of the administration, police and boardwalk merchants, everybody that was involved, is what helped curb the damage that could have been done by all the bad press,” Vaules said.
Levchuck, whose family owns multiple boardwalk businesses, said he is very sensitive to Ocean City’s brand, which he said is the primary reason why he chose to live here and grow business.
“There is nothing like Ocean City, New Jersey,” he said, noting he had front-row seat to the situation from his boardwalk business.
Like the others, he said police “did a fantastic job of solving the problem with unruly teens,” but said it was two years too late.
“We should have done this two years prior. It’s a good thing there is somebody like myself, who supports the people who believe in the values of Ocean City like I do, that was able to help put an end to that,” Levchuk said.
Winslow said the curfew must be maintained but suggested flexibility outside the boardwalk entertainment zone.
“People were starting to question whether it was safe to come to Ocean City. We cannot allow that to happen because that is what makes Ocean City so great,” he said.
Hartzell said the main reason why so many people come to Ocean City is because it’s safe.
“Safety is paramount, when you have families it is paramount,” he said. “That’s our brand. Our brand is the best brand. We need to love it, cherish it and pass it along to our kids and their kids.”
DeVlieger said he supports the curfew.
“It was a sad state of affairs for a couple of summers where we had Trenton, the governor and Trenton’s influence that was causing the chaos that was down here,” he said. “It was horrible but I commend the police for getting to the heart of things and making adjustments.”
Barnes said the decision was difficult and unpopular to a lot of people, but that he “100 percent support it.”
“It’s paramount to keep the island safe not only from natural disasters but from teenage kids,” he said.
– By CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff