POINT PLEASANT BEACH — The borough planning board has passed a resolution authorizing the board’s engineering firm to study the possibility of deeming the 89-year-old Coast Guard station in need of redevelopment.
Board Engineer Raymond Savacool explained that this measure would allow the planning board to examine the property of the old Coast Guard station, located at 24 Inlet Drive, and determine whether it should be zoned as an area in need of redevelopment or rehabilitation. This would not be a rezoning, as “the underlying zoning still applies,” according to Savacool. No cost has yet been determined for this study.
“This resolution merely authorizes the examination of a particular piece of property — that being the old Coast Guard station — and determining, based on redevelopment housing law, whether the property meets the statutory requirements for either redevelopment or rehabilitation,” said Savacool. “Those two things are slightly different.”
While both are types of revitalization efforts, redevelopment generally refers to new construction being done on a property whereas rehabilitation refers to refurbishment and updating of existing construction.
Savacool explained what this move would mean for the aging property, which was bought for $1.05 million by the Borough of Point Pleasant Beach in 2023 after its closing by the U.S. Coast Guard in 2017. Operations were moved to a newly built station across the street the same year.
“There are various criteria for redevelopment: substandard building conditions, abandonment, lack of use over several years, deleterious land use, natural hazards and some other things that won’t apply,” Savacool said. “So, the resolution really authorizes T&M Associates (the borough’s engineering firm) to conduct that study and then (determine) whether it is an area in need of rehabilitation or redevelopment.”
Designating the area “in need of redevelopment for non-condemnation purposes” would allow the borough to explore “creative” uses for the property.
“Subsequent to that, a redevelopment plan would then be formulated (by the borough). There would be public hearings held with regard to the redevelopment, and…it allows for a more creative reuse of the property that might not otherwise fit in with the underlying zoning ordinance as it currently exists,” he said.
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