Save Breton Woods

Natural Lands Trust has made an offer of $8.5 Million dollars to the Visitation Church for the 30+ acres on Laurel Ave.

This offer was rejected.

I would like to know why $8.5 million dollars is not enough for the Visitation Church or the diocese of Trenton.$8.5 Million can buy a lot of things. For instance the church said they were selling the property on Laurel Ave. to pave their parking lot. I think they could pave it in gold for that money.

Then they said it was going to be for a youth center, well they have a perfectly good building they could be using in the meantime for that purpose but it just sits there as a storage building. Then they were talking about building their youth center on the 30 acres but that was never brought to the town either.

The church collected a million dollars from parishioners over the years for this building and there was never anything done with this money. If I was a parishioner, I would want to know why.

Now they are in a deal with a developer from Texas to build 59 5 bedroom homes with full basements that can be converted into apartments. Think about how many people could live in each house, how many cars and the drain on our services this would cause.

The property was purchased by the church in the 80's for $10,000 and will not be sold until the developer gets the go ahead from the township, the county and the state. This is going to take a while. We are going on two years now.

If this happens, what does this mean to us? The woods will be lost never to be regained, the animals will be displaced, the traffic will be a nightmare, the schools will be over crowded, the flooding will be a disaster for the existing area, the pervious pavement they will have to use will require vacuuming every three months, it will require vacuuming after a 1" rainfall, you can't plow it and it will require special equipment to care for, all at the taxpayer expense. The four gigantic basins they have to install to control the stormwater runoff will be catch basins for garbage and mosquitos and will be a dangerous play area for children. The HOA will fail because there are no amenities. Brick (you and I) will have to assume the upkeep of this property.

Ask your church why 8.5 million dollars isn't enough. Call your diocese and ask them to accept the deal. Come to the rally at the church on Sunday October 16th at 2:30, bring signs, bring your children, teach them how to preserve our natural spaces! Come to the planning board meeting on Monday October 17th at 7pm at the Brick Civic Center to see for yourself what we are up against. We need everyone to get involved. You all have something to offer so please be there!

This is far from over and if anyone tells you different, they are probably on the other side!