'Save The Asbury Park Casino': Crowd Set To Turn Out Saturday On Boardwalk For 2nd Show Of Public Support

ASBURY PARK, NJ — An impassioned community, crying out valiantly to save what they say is an iconic piece of Asbury Park's history and future safe from the wrecking ball, is set to turn out Saturday for a second public show of support.

The event, organized by the Committee To Save The Asbury Park Casino, helmed by Robert Bruce Ender, will be held Saturday at 11 a.m. on the Asbury Park boardwalk in front of the Casino.

The show of support follows a crowd of hundreds that turned out Wednesday for a special city council meeting focusing on the Asbury Park Casino, where a history was outlined on the steps that led to the current situation and those in attendance were left with questions and, they said, few answers regarding a path forward to save the Casino.

Saturday's second planned show of support comes after the City of Asbury Park posted a notice stating their opposition to a demolition permit sought by the owners of the Casino property to raze the "breezeway" section of the building.

A red sign slapped onto the side of the Carousel building sounded an alarm for scores who are seeking answers. "This building has been declared unsafe for human occupancy," the notice read.

On January 27, the City of Asbury Park posted a statement regarding the potential demolition of the breezeway attached to the Casino building, written by Joseph J. Maraziti, Jr., Esq. of Maraziti Falcon LLP.

"With its request for a permit to demolish the Breezeway attached to the Casino Building, Madison Marquette has once again demonstrated its shocking disregard for the integrity of the iconic Asbury Park Boardwalk treasures that it has owned since 2010," the statement read. "The city is deeply disappointed in this latest illustration of a pattern of behavior that is disrespectful to the historic heritage of Asbury Park."

The statement continued: "Madison Marquette, through its subsidiary Madison Asbury Retail, LLC, has repeatedly breached the commitments it made when it entered into Subsequent Developer Agreement which it negotiated over 15 years ago with previous city officials to develop, finance, construct, operate, repair, and maintain, various sites of historic importance along the Boardwalk. The language of the 2010 agreement limits the legal options of the city to respond to breaches of the agreement by Madison Asbury Retail. Madison has routinely ignored notices of default issued by the city in the past."

And, the letter said: "There are multiple legal steps that must be taken by Madison Asbury Retail prior to the issuance of a demolition permit by the city construction officials. Among them, the city will insist on a report by a certified structural engineer as to the option to conduct repairs to assure public safety, rather than demolition of the building. As redevelopment counsel for the Asbury Park Waterfront Redevelopment Area, our firm has been charged with the task to identify creative options for the mayor and city council to consider in response to the plan to demolish the treasured Casino building."

Next, one day after letters were posted by the elected officials, including Senator Vin Gopal and Assemblywomen Margie Donlon and Luanne Peterpaul, urging Madison Marquette "to reconsider this course of action," a message appeared on the Asbury Park Boardwalk Facebook page — the page is operated by Madison Marquette — and on the developer's website.

This message also appeared one day before the first planned show of public support on the boardwalk, organized by Robert Bruce Ender.

"Several weeks ago, due to forecasts for stormy and snowy weather, we conducted a special inspection of the breezeway through the Casino building (that’s the part that is the extension of the boardwalk). This inspection noted an area of concern, and, to protect public safety, we closed the outdoor path to Ocean Grove," the message on the Asbury Park Boardwalk Facebook page said.

"We’re in Asbury. Rumors swirled. Specters of the implosion of the entire Casino building suddenly appeared all over social media. We even noticed a post about the curse of the Morro Castle. Understandably, our great State Senator Vin Gopal and our representatives Margie Donlan and Luanne Peterpaul expressed their concern over any potential demolition. Mayor Moor and the city council rightly urged us to find a solution."

The note continued: "We did. The breezeway will be repaired and preserved. As soon as the repairs are completed, the outdoor pathway to Ocean Grove will be reopened. Check back for updates."
The message assured that "there has never been any concern with the main portion of the Casino building – the Carousel, the vaulted area in the center, and wings on either side. Our incredibly creative team at Wooden Walls will continue to hold their series of imaginative and immersive events in the Carousel."

Requests for comment to Madison Marquette, Asbury Park Mayor John Moor, and Madison Asbury Retail were not immediately returned. No answer has been given despite multiple requests from Patch about whether the permit for demolition has been withdrawn.

Ender, who is organizing Saturday's public show up support — and who created the S.A.P.C. committee — issued a statement reflecting his thoughts after Wednesday's meeting.

"It seems that the Madison Marquette statement of February 6 was less a sincere promise to preserve the building and more of an effort to calm the response the public was having to the reality of losing it," Ender said he believes. "Its timing felt like an effort to pacify the people who were upset and minimize the turnout for the 'public show of support' in front of the Casino the next day. Some people were understandably misled, believing that the statement meant that the Casino walkthrough area was now going to be saved."

Ender maintained that, in his opinion: "That is not at all the case. The statement from the developer was very unspecific and didn’t offer any detailed commitments. It was intentionally vague. It promises to repair the building just enough to walk around it again. But unless they definitively state otherwise and contractually commit to it, the long-term plan is still to remove it. That statement was simply a quelling deferment."

And, he said: "Madison Marquette were probably surprised at the reactions in response to their applying for a demolition permit. They were surprised to receive a letter from Senator Vin Gopal’s office. They might have been hoping that over the last few years, with reduced access to the Casino, people were getting used to the idea of not having it. Maybe if they let it fall into a deeper state of disrepair, people might become less and less attached to it. To the point that if one day, it was knocked down, maybe enough people wouldn’t mind, and any fallout from the public would be tolerable and short-lived. Or maybe they thought that if they let it get rusty and unsightly enough, people wouldn’t like seeing it anymore, and then they wouldn’t mind losing it. Obviously, any of these were a great miscalculation, and the public and political response was swift and defiant. I’m inclined to quote the famous diary entry by Japan’s Admiral Yamamoto after the attack on Pearl Harbor: 'I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve'."

Many on social media asked why, if the Casino walk-through — closed since 2023 due to expressed safety concerns posed by structural steel trusses – were going to be repaired, the message put out by Madison Marquette said only "the outdoor pathway to Ocean Grove will be reopened."

The notice by the city sparked an immediate outpouring on social media, with scores of individuals sounding a rallying cry to save the Casino — the 1929 Beaux Arts structure was designed by Warren and Wetmore, who also designed Grand Central Terminal in New York City and the Convention Hall and Paramount Theater at the other end of the Asbury Park boardwalk.

Chuck Lada, administrator of the Facebook group "Save Asbury Park's History," has spoken with Patch about what he hoped to impart and said there has been an outpouring by thousands who want to see the Asbury Park Casino, Carousel building, Convention Hall and Paramount saved.

"The city's passive response to the deterioration of these buildings is puzzling. They have a legal right under the contract to declare an abandonment of these buildings by the owner and to take ownership back. . . We are past the point where we can expect repairs from Madison Marquette. Concerned people need to attend city council meetings and demand that the city take the buildings back to preserve them."

He added that if the structures were owned by the city, numerous funding avenues would be available that a private owner could not access. "These techniques were successfully used to save the Count Basie Theater," he said. "It is up to the city to step forward or accept the blame for their eventual demolition."

Lada has since kicked off a GoFundMe page, "Save Asbury Park's Historic Landmarks."

"After Wednesday's meeting we came away with more questions than answers. Let's work collectively to untie this Gordian knot," Lada said.

At the meeting Wednesday, Lada said the attorney was helpful in explaining "the mess we're in." He added: "We don't want to fight the city. Everybody here wants to save the building."

In his opinion, he said: "The most logical path to success, in my opinion, is condemnation. I'm happy to announce an anonymous donor has contacted me and pledged to fund $100,000 to the city from our non-profit if we can move the process forward to save these buildings."

If condemnation is considered the path forward, that donation will fund legal fees, he said. "In addition, this benevolent, anonymous individual will match another $100,000 if this group can find it within themselves, to start donating to start saving Asbury Park's history. That's giving the city $300,000 to start the condemnation."

A petition kicked off by James Calder, "Stop The Demolition of the Asbury Park Casino Building" has garnered 9,285 signatures so far.

"If they underestimated people’s attachment to that building, we’re here to remind them that in no uncertain terms, will it ever be acceptable, now, or in the future, to relinquish that portion of the Casino, or any other of the landmark buildings," Enders said. "A great number have been demolished over the years. These that remain should be regarded as 'untouchable”' This is a quote from the Supreme Court Case (P.C.T.C (owner/developer) vs. N.Y.C.) that saved New York’s Grand Central Station (same architects as the Casino): 'Landmarks cannot be divorced from their settings… (This building), in its setting, is a great example…such examples are not so plentiful in (this city) that we can afford to lose any of the few we have'/ Madison Marquette’s PR approach has reached its expiration date. They should no longer box everyone out of their clandestine plans, if they have any. If they want to continue to operate in Asbury Park with the necessary public, consumer, and political support they need, they’re going to have to find a way to preserve and integrate these places into their future plans. No soft-soap, no shell games. They’re going to have to play this one straight-up."