AVALON – The Borough Council has approved a $7 million bond ordinance for renovations of Bay Park Marina, and has awarded an $8.6 million construction contract for the project to Fred M. Schiavone Construction Inc. of Malaga.

The ordinance, adopted at the council’s Sept. 11 meeting, explicitly notes the use of the funds for bulkhead replacement and improvements to the marina building and kayak park, but it does not limit the funds to those purposes.

It also mentions a flood mitigation living shoreline project that Business Administrator Scott Wahl said at the Aug. 28 council meeting might be put off to the future.

The long-awaited Bay Park Marina project had been the victim of delays during the epidemic and then of an elongated permit process. It has now moved rapidly through council approval following a successful bidding process in which Schiavone Construction’s low bid came in almost $2 million under the engineering estimate.

The project brings together same team of Mott MacDonald engineering, Taylor Design Group and Schiavone Construction that produced the popular and successful Surf Side Park in 2019.