Point Pleasant Beach Officials Question NJ's Beach Access Plans

Point Pleasant Beach officials questioned the Murphy administration's plans to expand beach access on Wednesday, criticizing the governor for his priorities.

Councilman Paul Kanitra, who is the Republican nominee for Point Beach mayor in the November election, took issue with New Jersey officials saying they're looking at ways of expanding beach access – and making sure you can park and go to the bathroom nearby.

Kanitra said New Jersey is the most densely populated and built-out state in the country. "Trying to jam in additional parking and bathroom facilities up and down our coastline seems like an insurmountable and totally unnecessary endeavor," he said.

"This is yet another instance of the Murphy administration focusing on the wrong things instead of keeping our taxes low. Beach access is indeed a vital and important right for the residents of New Jersey, but the logistics of what the DEP is working on seems fraught with obstacles," he said.

Catherine McCabe, the state’s environmental protection commissioner, said the state Department of Environmental Protection "will address the different issues as we develop this rule of what does fair and equitable access mean with respect to parking and access to restroom facilities, which are kind of necessary if you want people to come to the beaches.

That could mean establishing more entry points, and perhaps opening up more beaches to the public that they're currently not allowed to access. Or they could even look at the price each beach is charging.

"It will not be an easy time," she said. "Lots of people have very strong opinions. We are all very very attached to our beaches and (keeping) our beaches the way they were. We don't like to change."

McCabe says New Jersey has not guaranteed the public the right to "have both physical and visual access to the water in a fair and equitable way."

"We will have to turn our attention to that very soon to look at the spots where we really are not providing people the access to the Shore that we should," McCabe said at a conference at Stockton University.

New Jersey previously had beach access rules that required public access points every quarter mile. But a court struck down those requirements in 2008.

McCabe, speaking to The Associated Press after her speech, signaled that she's looking to return to that standard. “A quarter of a mile to have to walk to get to a beach sounds like a good standard to me,” she said.

McCabe noted that New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy signed a law earlier this year that could ultimately eliminate private beaches, allowing anybody to go to any beach they want.

But there are some sticking points in the bill that beach-access advocates aren't happy about, and could defeat the purpose of the bill, they say. Read more: You Should Now Be Able To Go To Any NJ Beach – And Not Get Booted