One pavilion? Two pavilions? No pavilions?
We certainly know what they don’t want. They don’t want the plan that was soundly defeated in last summer’s special election and that has been reintroduced unchanged and attached to a very important infrastructure project that everybody wants done.
When I was out last year campaigning for a “no” vote in the special election I heard a lot of opinions about the pavilions. There were many folks who thought that the plans the mayor proposed were ok but feared that the cost included a lot of goodies for the laborers union and the electrical workers union. Having union members campaigning and paying for campaign materials only served to reinforce that belief.
Still others thought the buildings were bigger or fancier than they needed to be. Many thought we should only build what we can legally pay for without taking out long term bonds. The mayor’s suggestion to those who want to build, but for less, is for them to go out and hire their own architect, have plans made, and present those plans for the Council to summarily shoot down. The mayor says he wants to run Belmar like a business, but no business would say that to their customers. Maybe we’re not the people he considers to be his customers.
A surprising number of people I spoke with wanted only one pavilion or no pavilions. This is not an unpatriotic viewpoint. Nobody gave as a reason for opposing the reconstruction that they hated Belmar and were against its recovery. To the contrary, they thought the beach looked beautiful and natural the way it is and didn’t want to clutter it up with big buildings. Actually I have to wonder if the mayor loves Belmar so much, why does he want to redevelop the whole damn town from one corner to the other?
It’s too bad that the primary is only a week away. Had the mayor decided to bring back his pavilion plan a few months ago maybe we could have had on the primary ballot a public question about what people actually want up on the boardwalk. Now we would have to have a special election.
Maybe it would be worth it.
4 Comments
Sleazy politics. Sad that Belmar is behind the curve on Sandy recovery.
Bring back the vote, let the people decide how much to pay for the pavilions.
#1 Its not sleazy politics, its the 1000 plus voters that go along with the shenanigans, shame on them!!
As many people know, I don’t want the pavilions at all. The beach looks good as it is. The Taylor Pavilion activities were picked up easily by the rest of the town. The Monday evening orchestra performances were well attended at Piano Square. Everything was fine. As for the Police, Medical, and Lifeguard pavilion, every should understand all that’ll ever be is a clubhouse for those groups that nobody else can use. The police have done fine on foot patrol giving tickets so has the first aid in their ambulance. As far as the lifeguards are concerned, let them run after the guardettes some other place. We don’t have to provide them a safe place for their games. If we must do something, let’s provide them with an A-Z trailors. If it’s good enough for thousands of construction workers around the country, then it’s good enough for our people.
What is really embarrassing is the First Aid Squad does not have a nice sign on their trailer. Last year a cross was written in pencil on a white piece of paper.
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