North Wildwood continues to suffer beach and dune erosion caused by coastal storms. (Photo courtesy of North Wildwood Facebook page)
A legal battle is looming over a $54 million project that was supposed to replenish North Wildwood’s storm-damaged beaches and dunes, but has now fallen through amid government infighting.
North Wildwood filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, just days after the town was told by state Environmental Commissioner Shawn LaTourette that the beach project had collapsed and the funding would be directed elsewhere.
In a harshly critical statement accompanying the suit, North Wildwood Mayor Patrick Rosenello blasted the NJDEP
“Make no mistake, this collapse rests squarely on the shoulders of the NJDEP leadership,” Rosenello said.
Not stopping there, Rosenello went on to single out LaTourette in an extraordinary attack against a top state official.
“It is a black mark on the record of Commissioner LaTourette, who has failed catastrophically in one of the most fundamental responsibilities of his office: protecting New Jersey’s coastline and its people,” Rosenello said.
Rosenello’s statement characterized the project’s collapse as “one of the most stunning and consequential failures in the history of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection.”
NJDEP spokesman Larry Hajna said Thursday that the agency does not comment on pending litigation. Instead, Hajna referred to a letter that LaTourette wrote last week that “speaks for itself and accurately describes the situation.”
On Nov. 7, LaTourette sent a letter to Rosenello, as well as to the mayors of the neighboring shore communities of Wildwood, Wildwood Crest and Lower Township, informing them that North Wildwood’s beach replenishment project was off.
LaTourette blamed an impasse between the towns that involves Wildwood and Wildwood Crest refusing to share sand from their wide beaches to help restore North Wildwood’s depleted shoreline.
“Unfortunately, after years of costly engineering work and many attempts by DEP to help resolve local disagreements, the Project reached an impasse necessitating its termination,” LaTourette wrote.
A deadline for the North Wildwood project set by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has now passed, prompting the federal agency, to redirect the funds elsewhere, LaTourette told the mayors. The Army Corps of Engineers oversees beach restoration projects nationwide and had been collaborating with the NJDEP on plans for North Wildwood.
The Army Corps of Engineers and the NJDEP had been working with North Wildwood and the surrounding towns for years on the beach replenishment plan – known as the Hereford Inlet to Cape May Inlet Coastal Storm Risk Management project.
The idea was for Wildwood and Wildwood Crest to help their neighbor by sharing sand from their wide beaches. Plans also called for construction of a continuous protective dune system in all four municipalities, including Lower Township’s Diamond Beach section, along a strip of coastline known as Five Mile Island.
Those plans, though, have been abandoned now that Wildwood and Wildwood Crest have balked at allowing sand to be taken from their beaches and placed along North Wildwood’s eroded shoreline, according to LaTourette.
However, North Wildwood contends in its lawsuit, filed in state Superior Court, that LaTourette and the DEP have “a clear and critical duty” to enforce the sand-sharing agreement to keep the beach replenishment project alive.
“The agency’s inaction here stems not from legal barriers, but from a lack of political will and bureaucratic negligence,” Rosenello’s statement said.
North Wildwood had no other choice but to pursue the lawsuit to force the NJDEP to honor its obligations for the replenishment project, according to the statement.
“This action is not taken lightly, but as a vital last resort to defend our shores, safeguard lives and livelihoods, and expose the bureaucratic sabotage that has left our communities perilously exposed to the storms NJDEP itself predicts with alarm. Only through the courts can we now extract the justice and protection that NJDEP leadership has willfully withheld,” Rosenello said.
Serious beach erosion continues in North Wildwood in recent months following a series of hurricanes that churned up strong surf and gusty winds while passing by the Jersey Shore hundreds of miles off the coast.
In the latest blow, there was additional beach and dune damage caused by the powerful nor’easter over the Columbus Day weekend. Some of North Wildwood’s dunes were sheared away by the waves, leaving mini-cliffs more than 5 feet high, the NJDEP reported in a storm damage report.
