Posted on April 29, 2024
Following recent collaboration between Mayor Patrick Rosenello and Gov. Phil Murphy, a dredge is coming to replenish the city’s badly eroded beaches.
The “plan will begin over the next few weeks and is expected to provide relief to the community over the next few months,” according to a joint statement issued to the Herald April 25 by the governor and mayor. The two had more frequent talks in recent weeks, after Murphy showed increased interest in North Wildwood’s beachfront problem.
The state Department of Transportation’s Office of Maritime Resources is working to design and authorize the emergency dredging project, which will be a holding measure for the resort town until the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and state Department of Environmental Protection are able to complete the Five Mile Dune Project, according to the statement.
Survey boats were visible earlier in the week around Hereford Inlet and elsewhere off the North Wildwood coast. The borrow area for the project and other details have not yet been publicly disclosed.
Also not disclosed is who will pay for the project and how much, if any, of its cost will fall to North Wildwood.
There were at least two remote meetings between city officials, the governor’s office, state Sen. Mike Testa, the DOT and the DEP in the past two weeks, the Herald learned. A public records request submitted by the newspaper for communications between those agencies and the city was denied earlier this week. The city clerk, W. Scott Jett, cited an exemption to the public records law for “inter-agency advisory, consultative, or deliberative material.”
In the release, Murphy, a Democrat, and Rosenello, a Republican, highlighted the bipartisan cooperation that led to the interim project.
