DEP hears opposing views on beach club proposal
Family member pleads for sale, but opponents want site preserved
BY LIZ SHEEHAN
Correspondent

Life Saving Station No. 5, now the Takanassee Beach Club.

LONG BRANCH - In front of a room packed with opponents of the proposed development of the Lake Takanassee Beach Club, Ginger Peters, one of the owners of the club, explained her reasons why the property must be sold, while others presented the case for keeping the site and its historic buildings intact.

Peters spoke at a public hearing at the city hall Jan. 11 held by the N.J. Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) on an application for a permit under the Coastal Area Facility Review Act by a developer seeking to build 21 dwellings at the site.

Peters' written statement was read by her attorney, Harry Osborne, because she was unable to read it aloud. Peters said that she needed the funds from the sale of the property for her care since she has cerebral palsy and spinal stenosis.

Her mother had provided her primary care, Peters said, prior to her death in 1999. But since then Peters said she has had to pay for caretakers.

She said her income, including the beach club, cannot cover the costs for her caregivers and medical needs, and because she is part owner of the club, with her brother, she cannot qualify for aid.

"My mom died," Peters said in the statement, adding that she believes her share of the sale of the property would take "care of me for the rest of my life."

Brian Unger, one of several Long Branch Borough Council members who spoke in favor of preserving the club site, said that the Peters family had made "a great contribution to Long Branch," and to the whole coastline while running the club.

He said that it "was just a matter of who buys it."

"Too many historic structures have been lost," Unger said.

He said he had discussed the site, which is priced at $14 million, with officials in the state Green Acres Program and Mayor Adam Schneider.

"In my view this is the way to go," he said.

The Green Acres Program is "very, very well aware of this site," Unger said,

The program gives municipalities and counties low-interest loans and grants to buy open space and to develop outdoor recreation areas.

A representative of Rep. Frank Pallone Jr., (D-6.), read a statement from the congressman that said he wanted to add his "strong opposition" to residential development of the beach club site.

"I know this development is more of what we don't need here," Pallone said.

He said that Takanassee Lake was already overtaxed and silting up, and the development of the beach club site could cause the "death knell" of fishing in the lake.

Pallone, as did several others, cited the historic significance of the three former life saving stations on the site, one built in 1878-79, the second in 1897 and the last in 1903.

Penelope Watson, a member of a group dedicated to the preservation of life-saving stations, said that the buildings should be preserved as they were "very rare," with the only other group of three life-saving buildings on one site being in Michigan.

Others spoke of the important historic significance of the site and the buildings and the environmental damage the new development would cause while some speakers said that the dwellings planned to replace the old buildings were too close to the ocean and would not survive in the storms that sweep the coast.

John Weber, from the Surfrider Founder, said his organization had problems getting access to documents giving information about the proposal, and asked that the DEP delay taking action on any decision on the permit application until those opposed to the permit could get more information on the developer's proposal.

He also said that he had not been able to obtain information on Takanassee Developers, listed by the DEP as the applicant, and had checked records in New Jersey, New York and Delaware but did not find the company registered.

After Nathan Fishman, who lives in Imperial House, next to the beach club, said that only half of the residents there had received notice of the meeting, John Policarpo, project manager in the DEP Bureau of Coastal Regulation, said his department would make a decision whether the 15-day comment period on the proposal would be extended.

After the meeting, Larry Jacobs, attorney for the developer, gave the name of Chera, from Allenhurst, as the developer. On Tuesday a staff member of Jacobs' firm, Farer Fersko, Westfield, said the developer was Isaac Chera.

The name of the developer was not referred to by Jacobs at the meeting and the plan for the site was not exhibited or available until the end of the two-hour meeting when it was set up in a corner of the meeting room at the municipal building.

Asked why it was not made available before or during the meeting for public viewing, one of the group accompanying Jacobs said that the client did not want it to be.

After the meeting Jacobs also said that discussions were being held about moving the buildings if the development proceeds, either to an oceanfront site or one on an inlet.

Only one speaker spoke in favor of the sale, Cathy Dashevsky, who said she had cared for Ginger Peters for "her entire life."

She said she thought it was "very unfair" for people to expect Peters not to sell the property for "other people's needs to be met."