Sample blog for Ocean City
Paul Chiolo, of Keller Williams Realty, seen here looking out of a door in an unrented house, said Ocean City realtors had hoped to attract a lot of vacationers who couldn’t find places in areas that were hit harder by Hurricane Sandy. However, he said, that didn’t happen, and the rental market started out softly.
(David Gard/For the Star-Ledger)
Still dreaming about the perfect Shore vacation rental this summer? Hurricane Sandy may have made it possible to get one for less cash.
One massive storm. Many towns devastated. Track the recovery around New Jersey.
Some spacious and amenity-rich houses are being offered for less this month because of a cloud of uncertainty still looming over the Shore as a result of the storm, several realtors said.
A five-bedroom oceanfront house in Surf City had its rent lowered from $7,000 per week to $5,000, according to Cyndy Friedland, of Oceanside Realty in Harvey Cedars. And in Lavallette, a five-bedroom home on Bay Boulevard was recently negotiated down $300 to $2,400 a week, said Anthony Belli, of Schlosser Real Estate.
Renters have found themselves with more leverage this summer, as a slow arrival of vacationers forced some property owners to be more flexible on how much they charge for stays.
“I deal with three realtors and I have a sign in front of the house,” said Michael Cronin, who has had trouble renting out a three-bedroom home in Normandy Beach this summer. “I had a few calls, but very little action. I definitely would budge, but I just didn’t get many calls.” — Eugene Paik
— Behind the double doors of a 20,000 square foot property next to a Dollar General store in Toms River, thousands of people each month find some relief from the financial burden of recovering from Hurricane Sandy.
The source of comfort is The People’s Pantry, an operation initially founded by the township’s school district as a distribution point for an influx of donations received after the Oct. 29 storm. Nine months later the pantry has transformed itself into a comprehensive relief center offering a range of services to a community still struggling to recover.
“People have liquidated their savings. They’ve exhausted their personal credit. They’ve taken equity loans. They’ve liquidated 401ks,” said Patricia Donaghue, the executive director of the pantry. “This is a middle-class area. Nobody’s sitting on a buttload of money. The need is just — it’s crazy.”
Each month, the pantry helps fill grocery needs for up to 2,500 individuals, most of whom were affected by the storm, Donaghue said.
On Tuesday morning, Harry Wagner walked through the pantry filling a small, black cart with toiletries, frozen chicken, soup and other goods.
“This place is a Godsend,” the 84-year-old Toms River resident said. — Erin O’Neill
KITES AND CASTLES
New Jersey’s “Stronger Than The Storm” campaign is sponsoring a “Kites and Castles” workshop on sandcastle-building or kite-making in Seaside Park this weekend.
Marching into the ocean has become a tradition
By CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff
OCEAN CITY — A pirate, a mermaid, a crab, a bear and Mr. Mature America joined a marching band, a soccer team, a historian, four princesses, hundreds of spectators and dozens of business persons as Ocean City officials kicked off another summer in America’s Greatest Family Resort.
The Unlocking of the Ocean and Business Persons Plunge, held May 28 at Ninth Street beach just south of the Ocean City Music Pier, was the 18th since its humble beginnings as a way to celebrate the start of the season — for the public and the many merchants who make it possible for their vacations at the shore.
It was created by real estate agent John Walton of Keller Williams Jersey Shore and legendary city publicist Mark Soifer, the brains behind many of Ocean City’s family-friendly events, including saltwater taffy sculpting and the Freckle Contest, to name a few.
Michael Allegretto, aide to Mayor Jay Gillian, said turning a key in the sand to signal the start of summer is a long-standing tradition started by the Ocean City Beach Patrol Alumni Association and that the plunge was created to complement the event.
“It’s really a great way to kick off Ocean City’s Memorial Day weekend and say: ‘We’re open for business. Summer is here,’” Allegretto said, adding the event traditionally draws a large crowd.
“Everyone is excited to be part of the plunge and we get families coming down to watch the event,” he said.
Allegretto said the event is part of Soifer’s long legacy of creating fun family events.
“Unlocking the Ocean and the plunge is a total Mark Soifer event,” Allegretto said. “I’m sure if he were here he’d be proud of us carrying it on.”
He said Walton has “taken the baton and kept it going, and he tries to build it and make it better every year. He recruits everybody. He shows the enthusiasm for it, so he’s a big part of the event.”
Walton, sharing some beach space with Paul Chiolo, operating principal and owner of Keller Williams Jersey Shore, said the event began in 2004 as part of the city’s 125th anniversary, during which a committee planned and held 125 events.
“It was sort of a Monty Python two-hour event that had pretty humble beginnings, but I knew this would catch on,” Walton said. “We decided a zany, fun, paparazzi-filled event was going to grow, and here it is 18 years later.”
Walton still carries the same briefcase he started with in 2004 — “I think there’s some contracts in there because I can’t, it’s rusted shut,” he said — but has replaced his shoes and suit.
“The shoes are 15 years old and the suit is from Boyds, a fine Italian suit. This is the ninth year for this suit and it’s getting a little tight,” Walton said.
As the mayor and City Council members joined city staff and the Greater Ocean City Chamber of Commerce, Allegretto addressed the crowd, which had begun to swell 30 minutes earlier.
Beside the podium, the city’s royal representatives consisted of Miss Ocean City Mary Grace Jamison, Junior Miss Ocean City Natalie Argento, Little Miss Ocean City Antonella DiAntonio, Miss New Jersey Teen Isabella Freund and Mr. Mature America Jack Merritt. Mascots Wonder Bear and Martin Z. Mollusk also took part.
Ocean City Beach Patrol historian Fred Miller provided the key and officials joined in turning it in the sand as the business persons prepared for their marine march. The ceremony has been held for more than a century in Ocean City.
Fully clothed and many carrying brief cases, signs and other tools of their trade, the merchants proceeded to take the first dip of the summer, traversing the strand to the tune of “Pomp and Circumstance” by the Ocean City High School Band.
The event was big news, with both print and broadcast journalists from southern New Jersey and Philadelphia gathering to witness the annual rite of passage into summer.
Amid all of the merry-making, one moment stood out in stark contrast.
Teenager Joelle McElroy had a captive audience and a large media contingent for her explanation of the Occupant with Autism program she is promoting.
The 17-year-old high school junior from Riverside, Burlington County, partnered with the nonprofit Louie’s Voice Inc. for her National Honor Society project. McElroy, whose family spends summers in the city, said Louie’s Voice creates decals that inform first-responders that an autistic person is in the home or vehicle.
“Lou Berman teamed up with me to offer them to families that are vacationing in Ocean City to put them on windows, on cars, so when first-responders come to their house that they are vacationing at, they know that there’s an autistic kid in there,” she said.
McElroy said autistic children create a place where they feel safe and can have an adverse reaction when removed from it.
“If a fire happens, they don’t know what to do,” she said, noting the idea stemmed from an incident in Philadelphia in which a nonverbal autistic child was home alone when a fire started in his home.
“He went to his bedroom, which was his safe place. When the fire company came in, they screamed and didn’t hear anything and left, and he ended up perishing in his bedroom,” she said. “So that’s why they created these decals and I’m here to present them.”
The Ocean City Nor’Easters soccer team was there to get their feet wet. Coach Alan McCann said the team joined the event to thank the community for its support.
“The city has been brilliant to the club for many years and since these boys were welcomed into the community three weeks ago, they’ve opened their arms and they’ve taken them in. So for us being here, it’s almost a thank you from our side,” McCann said. “We are lucky to be involved in it, and whatever is going on in the community we hope to be a staple in there and help boost the profile and help in any way we can.”
Merritt called it part of the “kitschy little family-oriented events that are part of the draw and the allure of Ocean City. I think it just makes people smile, and any time you can do that it’s a good thing.”
‘I probably watched two dozen people jump’
Bernard Kerik
SOMERS POINT — “I probably watched two dozen people jump. As they got closer to the ground, the air pulled them away from the buildings. When they hit the awnings on the outside of the towers, it was like they exploded.”
That’s how Bernard Kerik, 40th commissioner of the New York City Police Department, opened his presentation, “Leadership in Crisis,” a gripping first-hand account of the events of Sept. 11, 2001, during a luncheon Sept. 16 at Greate Bay Country Club.
“As I waited for the mayor, about three minutes before he arrived the second plane slammed through the north side of the tower above me,” Kerik continued. “I’m looking up 75 floors and all I can see is this orange fireball.”
Kerik, 66, was in charge of the 55,000-person agency during the worst terror attack in world history, when 19 al-Qaida terrorists crashed two jetliners into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, destroying the complex and killing nearly 3,000 people. Kerik oversaw the police response to the attacks, coordinating rescue measures and later recovery efforts.
On that morning 20 years ago, a total of four commercial airliners were hijacked mid-flight with the goal of flying them into high-profile symbols of America. While New York City scrambled to deal with the aftermath of the attacks there, American Airlines Flight 77 was flown into the west side of the Pentagon, causing a partial collapse of the building’s side. The fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, was flown in the direction of Washington, D.C., but hearing of the earlier attacks, the passengers attempted to regain control of the aircraft and forced a crash-landing in a field near Shanksville, Pa. Investigators determined its target was either the White House or the U.S. Capitol.
Not only was it the single deadliest terrorist attack in history, but it extracted a heavy toll from the ranks of the city’s first responders: 340 firefighters and 72 police officers lost their lives.
Kerik noted that not only were the Twin Towers destroyed but “Towers One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six and Seven were all destroyed.”
Paul Chiolo, operating principal of Keller Williams Jersey Shore, which hosted the event, introduced Kerik, who joined the NYPD in 1986 and served as commissioner of the New York City Department of Corrections from 1998–2000.
“We wanted to do something to honor 9/11, especially on the 20th anniversary. I don’t know what it was particular about to this year — every year there are ceremonies and remembrances — but this year it seems to have hit home more than others,” Chiolo said. “I really can’t put my finger on why but on social media and regular media, it seemed that people were posting a lot of sentiments, more than I ever saw before. So we thought it would be a great opportunity to bring in someone that had boots on the ground, that could share with us a little of the realities that we probably don’t know.”
Timeline: Boots on the ground
Kerik’s presentation included information about where he was and what he was doing while not only witnessing but responding to the tragic events of that day, as well as some light-heated anecdotes that can be laughed at only now that some of the wounds have partially healed.
— 8:46 a.m.
Flight 11 smashes into Tower One of the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan.
“The emergency response was immediate and massive,” Kerik said, noting members of the NYPD, Fire Department of New York and the Port Authority Police Department arrived within a minute of the plane striking the tower.
Kerik said all of the senior executives of the PAPD, which was headquartered at 7 World Trade Center, were having breakfast at Windows on the World atop Tower One.
“They lost their senior executives. They died that morning,” Kerik said.
Rescue workers began assisting the injured and evacuating the building and surrounding highways were closed to nonemergency vehicles.
Kerik arrives at Tower Seven, where EMTs were treating people for injuries.
“Radio frequencies were designated for emergency services only and we initiated crowd control,” he said.
— 9:02 a.m.
Flight 175 slams into the south side of Tower Two.
“I am on the opposite side of that building waiting for the mayor to arrive. Beams weighing 17,000 pounds per linear foot, that’s what’s coming down in the street,” Kerik said.
Mayor Rudy Giuliani arrives at Tower Seven just 2 minutes after the second plane hits.
“We had emergency service protocols for just about everything you could think of. Every month we had mock drills, table-top exercises, plans, preparations, practice for just about every scenario,” Kerik said.
After Flight 175 strikes, it is clear it is more than an accident, that the United States is under attack, Kerik said.
“When the second plane hit Tower Two, the first thing that went through my mind when I realized we were under attack — I didn’t see that plane, that plane came from the other side and blew out the north side of the building. All I saw was the fireball — I could hear the aviation pilots yelling to central command that it was a second aircraft. At that point I knew we were under attack. My first thought was, ‘How many more planes are there?’”
Kerik called for the evacuation of City Hall, police headquarters, the Empire State Building, United Nations — “any building I could think of that might be a target in Manhattan.”
Frozen zones were established, all subways stations south of 14th Street were closed. The area was evacuated. Giuliani contacted the White House and other officials and the military assumed control of New York airspace.
“Condition Omega called for the entire closure of New York City, the first time that had ever been done,” Kerik said.
He said it was not until a year later, on the first anniversary of the attacks, that he saw footage of what had taken place.
“I was a little busy at the time, wasn’t watching TV. Didn’t know what was going on on the outside with the coverage,” he said. “On the first anniversary I sat in my living room and watched hours of coverage from the year before. Sat there shocked, crying. But I saw the sign ‘New York City closed.’ It was the first time, hopefully the last.”
First responders began to evacuate more than 1 million people out of Lower Manhattan in what Kerik called “the greatest evacuation in the history of this country.”
“They took between 20,000 and 25,000 people from these buildings. Then they took over a million people and evacuated them into the four boroughs and into New Jersey,” he said, noting the contributions of the Garden State’s first responders.
“I have so much admiration for the Jersey cops who responded, because if they didn’t make it into Manhattan, they made it to Jersey City where they were on the other side of the water and helping us get people off the shore on the New York side, sticking them on every boat we could find, to the Jersey side,” he said.
Kerik said dispatch centers received thousands of calls for help, noting there is a room at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum where visitors can listen to recordings — “it’s hard, it’s a rough thing to do” — of the 911 calls.
“99 percent of the people who called for help from within the towers did not make it. Everybody above the impact zone in both buildings died,” he said.
When Giuliani arrived at the scene, he wanted to see the damage to Tower One so they walked to West Street where there was a temporary command post.
“We went into that command post where we met the first deputy commissioner of the fire department — that’s the No. 2 guy — met with the chief of the department — that’s the No. 3 guy — and met with chief of operations — that’s the No. 4 guy — and met with Father Michael Judge,” Kerik said.
Kerik and Giuliani were told it was not anticipated that the buildings would collapse but that all of the structures above the impact zone — and everybody that was within the impact zone and above the impact zone — would be lost.
“As we were leaving, Father Judge, who was the chief chaplain of the Fire Department, said ‘Wait!’ He ran up to Mayor Giuliani and grabbed him by the arm. And the mayor turned around and Father Judge made a cross above his head and said, ‘God bless you, go in peace and please, please be careful.’”
— 9:37
Flight 77 hits the Pentagon and the Federal Aviation Administration halts all flight operations at U.S. airports. The Pentagon, White House and U.S. Capitol are evacuated.
— 9:45 a.m.
Giuliani is inside the Merrill Lynch office waiting to talk to the president.
“The vice president was coming to the phone and someone got on and said ‘Mr. Mayor, we’ve got to go, the Pentagon just got hit,’ and he hung up the phone. I was standing in the doorway and the mayor was sitting behind a small desk and repeated what he had just heard and as he did, the building we were in began to shake like a freight train was coming through it.
“The door slammed open and my chief yelled, ‘It’s coming down.’ I didn’t know if he meant the building we were in, but I knew we had a problem because all of the windows on the outside of the building were all blown out,” Kerik said. “And this soot, and this gas and this white dust came pouring into the building. There was paper everywhere. Everybody we had just left, all those guys I told you about, every single one of them died. We just left there. We were with them 10 to 15 minutes ago.”
Tower Two implodes and “110 thousand tons, 110 floors came down to the ground within 10 seconds. The magnitude of the force, I believe, was like the equivalent of a nuclear blast,” Kerik said.
— 10:03 a.m.
Flight 93 crashes into a field in Shanksville, President George W. Bush puts the military on high alert and a portion of the Pentagon collapses. The United Nations, Justice Department and U.S. State Department are evacuated
— 10:28 a.m.
Tower One collapses.
“We were in the middle of the street, walking up Church Street trying to get to the New York City Police Academy. Tower One collapses within 8 seconds and registers as a Magnitude 2 earthquake,” Kerik said.
Electrical service, gas and telecommunications are completely lost. A chain-link fence is erected around the World Trade Center as a crime scene.
The city’s command center, where the mayor would run disaster response, collapses at about 5 p.m. and a new headquarters is established at the Jacob Javits Center.
“To give you an idea of the speed at which we were working, I would say we completely rebuilt that command center with telecommunications, data, computers, visuals, cameras, I think within 72 to 96 hours,” Kerik said, noting there was space for every city agency as well as state and federal authorities.
‘We’ve got to open the Stock Exchange’
Kerik said the morning of Sept. 12, he walked into the police academy where there was a temporary command center and found Giuliani sitting at a desk
“He has his feet up on the desk and a box of Cheerios and he’s got a book in his hand. He’s reading the book and it’s Churchill’s book on leadership. He’s reading that book, he’s eating Cheerios from the box. I say ‘Good morning, sir’ and I’m trying to visualize what he is doing and he says, ‘We’ve got to open the Stock Exchange.”
“I said ‘Mr. Mayor, the Stock Exchange can’t open this morning because it’s covered in about 2 foot of dust and I don’t think any of the computers work and they have structural damage on the front of the building.’ And I gave him a litany of reasons,” Kerik said. “He said, ‘Get Dick Russell on the phone right now.’”
Russell told the mayor it was going to take a month to open the Stock Exchange.
“He said, ‘If it takes a month to open the Stock Exchange, I am going to call the board and get you fired. I want the Stock Exchange open as fast as possible. The people that did this to us did it for a reason. They targeted those two buildings, the two largest economic symbols in the nation. That was their target for a reason. We have to prove them wrong, get the Stock Exchange open.’ And on the morning of Sept. 17, the Stock Exchange opened.”
By the numbers
— World Trade Center situated on 16 acres with 12 million square feet of enclosed space
— 15,000 people worked in seven buildings.
— 10,000 daily visitors and 150,000 commuters
— 13,365 customers without power
— 5,880 customers with gas
— 300,000 telephone lines down, no cellular service
— 2,795 confirmed dead: 2,392 civilians, 343 FDNY, 37 PAPD, 23 NYPD
— 12,382 total injuries
—294 recovered bodies
— 19,800 recovered remains
— 1,468 victims identified
— 19,993 DNA samples collected
By CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff
A legal fight over property at the corner of Bay Avenue and Ninth Street overlooking the main gateway into Ocean City will continue — at least for a couple more weeks.
Superior Court Judge Julio Mendez told the city and the owner of Keller Williams, Paul Chiolo, who has plans to build a corporate office there, to try to reach an agreement, Chiolo said after a hearing in civil court in Atlantic City on Tuesday.
“There is not a conclusion at this point. The judge really didn’t come to any decision,” Chiolo said. “Both sides gave facts as we see it, and the judge, and the attorneys, agreed to take a little bit of time to digest everything and potentially both sides could come to some kind of an agreement. The judge was very open to the parties trying to negotiate and work this out amongst themselves.”
Ocean City spokesman Doug Bergen said the city does not comment on pending litigation. But over the past several months the city has made it clear it wants to seize the property, a vacant lot where an abandoned Exxon gas station used to be, through eminent domain, and use it for open space. Chiolo purchased the property in 2016 for $500,000 and knocked down the old blighted gas station. Since then, the city offered to buy the land for $650,000.
Chiolo received planning board approval to build an approximately 4,900-square-foot corporate office there. The project would include landscaping to the front of the building along Ninth Street and it could serve as a park for joggers and bicyclists using the Route 52 Causeway. It would also include a “pet fountain” for people walking their dogs.
An architectural rendering of the project shows park-like landscaping in front of the proposed office building along Ninth Street.
“We really supplied the park environment that the public was asking for,” Chiolo said of his plans to provide a park-like setting.
Some Council members called Chiolo’s project “a beautiful building,” when he went before the governing body to detail his plan in November. However, the overall decision came down to the public wanting the area to be green space, not another building.
In addition to the Keller Williams site, the city plans to make two former gas station sites across the street into open space. The city bought an old BP station last year for $475,000 and is close to acquiring an old Getty station site next door.
Chiolo remarked that the area is odd for open space. There are businesses in that area, including a paint store. And it is a main route to the beaches, Boardwalk and other attractions in the center of town. He said he will continue to fight for his project and await the next day in court.
He also said he is, and has been, disappointed for “quite some time.”
He said he revised plans for the project according to what was needed for planning board approval. Once he scaled back the project from 7,000 to 4,900 square feet, the city decided to take the property.
“That is the main issue. We had planning board approval and then City Council got together and voted to condemn the property,” Chiolo said.
He said he has been a real estate broker for 31 years and there is a real abuse of eminent domain all over the country.
“It really needs to be looked at because there are real misuses of power. It could be a beachfront home, or a home on a side street,” he said. “The rights of the owners need to be protected.”
Chiolo said he is open to the possibility of selling his property to the city, but his focus is to build his project.
“Would I be willing to sell it to the city? Yes. Look, that was never the intention,” Chiolo remarked. “It was always the intention to build our headquarters there. That is our goal, and always has been our goal. We still want to build this project.”
Some Council members say the public wants green space, not another building, at the Ninth Street corridor, one of the reasons they want to seize the property through eminent domain.
DIAMOND BEACH, N.J., May 17 /PRNewswire/ — The Grand at Diamond Beach, an oceanfront oasis located on the Jersey Shore, will hold the Grand Opening of its new Sales Gallery on Saturday, May 29th, running throughout the Memorial Day weekend, with a special showing from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, May 29th. Refreshments will be served on location at 9601 Atlantic Avenue, Diamond Beach, NJ, 08260.
The new Sales Gallery will showcase the luxury condominium’s generous proportions and high-end features. Located in The Pearl, a four-bedroom residence with panoramic ocean views, the Sales Gallery measures over 3,000 square feet on two levels, including a dual-staircase foyer and a 3,412 square foot wraparound veranda—the largest residential veranda on the Jersey Shore.
The Sales Gallery was designed by McGovern Design Studio, a Washington, DC–based interior design firm established by William McGovern. McGovern recently completed designs for the renovation of the renowned Jefferson Hotel in Washington D.C. with his prior firm. Said McGovern: “The residence itself is so well designed, so wide open. It lends itself naturally to that casual-elegant look—what I call ‘beach-chic.'”
Paul Chiolo, owner of Oceanside Realty, the sales team for The Grand, said, “We look forward to the Open House over Memorial Day weekend. Building on the success of our current ’15 More Sweet Pieces of the Shore’ promotion, it will introduce people to the premier property on the Jersey shore. We even have a kids’ area with TV and video games so the parents can relax a bit,” he said. “After all, that’s what coming to the shore is all about, right?”
The Grand at Diamond Beach is an oceanfront oasis, with panoramic views, designer-appointed features and finishes, and comprehensive amenities that provide an unparalleled four-season shore lifestyle.
Oceanside Realty, the premier Realtor® in Cape May County, is led by broker/owner Paul Chiolo. Oceanside takes a team approach to every transaction, always placing the emphasis on complete customer satisfaction.
McGovern Design Studio is a full-service interior design firm based in Washington, DC, that offers residential, commercial, and institutional clients a new take on interior design.
Web: www.thegrandatdiamondbeach.com
SOURCE The Grand at Diamond Beach
THEY are seemingly at the top of their game, earning $500,000 or more each year — in some cases much more — buying and selling real estate. So, one might wonder, why do some of the most successful brokers in the country need to have coaches to cajole them into aiming even higher?