CAPE MAY – City Council introduced an ordinance amending the city code on construction fees. The amendments were the result of work by a steering committee of Realtors and city officials.
Mayor Edward Mahaney said the new ordinance contained no change to fees, but it did deal with two important issues:
* The need for a certificate of flood damage prevention compliance.
* A certificate of continuing occupancy.
This ordinance establishes processes compliant with Federal Emergency Management Agency rules and helps maintain the city’s discount rate on flood insurance premiums.
Mahaney added that the city would be publishing a newsletter at the end of July to provide the best information to the public on the two certificates and the processes related to them. The intent is to get this newsletter in the hands of property owners before the open public hearing on the ordinance on Aug. 16.
Beach Safety
City Manager Bruce MacLeod reported on progress developing a series of videos that would highlight specific dangers at city beaches. The concern over spinal and other serious injuries at city beaches has led to the formation of a Beach Safety Committee.
The city has taken some steps this year to improve and extend the public education efforts related to beach safety.
A dangerous slope in the surf zone area of beaches, which some say was exacerbated by years of beach replenishment, has been the subject of numerous discussions at council meetings leading up to the creation of the committee.
Advocates for greater efforts on beach safety, such as Dennis DeSatnick, a committee member and parent of a man who suffered a serious spinal injury in a beach accident, continue to argue that the city is not doing enough.
DeSatnick has praise for the education efforts but wants a plan to deal physically with the beach slope problem.
“I feel we have been placated the entire winter,” DeSatnick said. He went on to charge that the city has only focused on the education effort and made no other significant progress on the issue of beach safety. MacLeod has indicated that the city is trying to get representation from the Army Corps of Engineers and the state Department of Environmental Protection to attend a Safety Committee meeting. DeSatnick, indicating distrust of the extent of the city efforts to get the outside representation, pressed MacLeod for specific names of officials he has been inviting.
DeSatnick has been critical of the city’s efforts in the past. MacLeod and Mahaney have frequently countered with an explanation of the layers of overlapping regulations that control what can and cannot be done on the beaches.
Mahaney has often indicated that he is trying to get the Army Corps to acknowledge a link between replenishments and the slope problem. His hope is that recognition of such a linkage would spur the corps to take more ownership of the engineering problems on the beaches.
Those supporting more direct intervention on the beaches have expressed frustration with the continued passage of time without action that goes beyond public education efforts.
Police Department
Ex-police chief Robert Boyd challenged MacLeod and the council to take more direct action concerning the manpower issues in the Police Department.
Boyd, who has been critical of the city’s handling of the ongoing controversy with its ex-chief and now Capt. Robert Sheehan, called on MacLeod to fill vacancies in the command structure of the department.
A little over two years ago, the department had a command structure that included a chief, a captain, and a lieutenant.
Sheehan serves as captain and heads the department with the next highest ranking officer being a sergeant.
Boyd was critical of the fact that the city has had seven months to fill the vacancy left by the retirement of Chuck Lear and has not done so. MacLeod responded with an explanation of the Civil Service process and specific problems that occurred in that process in the last year.
Lear, a candidate for mayor, sat in the back of the public space observing the meeting.
To contact Vince Conti, email vconti@cmcherald.com.
Wildwood – So Liberals here on spout off, here's a REAL question for you.
Do you think it's appropriate for BLM to call for "Burning down the city" and "Black Vigilantes" because…
