VILLAS — Three homes and two electric utility poles in the vicinity of Redwood and Beechwood avenues are threatened by erosion from Delaware Bay here following a number of autumn storms.
Planner/Engineer Steve Fillipone made a presentation to Lower Township Council Monday on behalf of three homeowners. He said the area of greatest erosion is in a right-of-way owned by the township.
Storms have taken away 15-feet of dune, he said.
Fillipone said the homeowners wished to replenish the dune at their own expense. Since the dune is in a township right-of-way, the homeowners cannot make application to the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) on their own.
Fillipone requested a resolution from council to allow an application to DEP by the homeowners.
“What we’d like to do is construct a bulkhead 175-feet in length,” he said. “That would be the core of the beach replenishment.”
Redwood Avenue homeowner Jodie Swope said she saw four to five feet of dune disappear last winter. In October, 15-feet of dune disappeared in one weekend, she said.
DEP declared that her home was in imminent danger, said Swope.
“Every tide that comes by and every storm that comes by, we are not sleeping,” she said. “We are fearful for our homes.”
Swope said there was only a foot and half of dune left before the electric poles will be eroded away.
Township Solicitor Tony Monzo suggested the township could vacate Beechwood Avenue, which would give title of the properties to the homeowners up to the beach area. He said that would free the township from having some liability for construction in a public right-of-way.
Mayor Michael Beck said Lower Township Planning Official Bill Galestock would look at the properties and a resolution could be passed at the next council meeting.
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