In 1994, Vice President Al Gore came to the Maurice River in southern NJ to highlight the designation of the Maurice River as National Wild and Scenic River and to announce the construction of a new conservation center on Delaware Bay. The project was the brainchild of Donald Fauerbach who wished to create a center based on the twin themes of the Delaware Bay’s maritime and natural history. The center was never built despite $6 million available from the state capital fund made available during the Whitman administration. The project died amidst conflicts over land ownership and a calcified process of capital construction in NJ state government. Ultimately, Don Fauerbach threw in the towel on that project but later achieved local notoriety for being the chief sponsor of the NJ motorsports park. The park, an anathema to conservationists and in many ways the complete opposite of a conservation center, was nonetheless well received in a community in need of jobs. Ironically the sound of the racing cars can be heard from the still-vacant site of the conservation center and along the Maurice River.
NJ Motorsports Park in Millville
The anecdote is telling because it describes the often sad fate of capital and restoration projects on the Delaware Bay in New Jersey. Although it is widely accepted by the residents as an immutable fact of life, the state has invested virtually nothing in infrastructure to aid conservation or the restoration of degraded habitat in the Delaware Bay. Yes, millions have been spent on preserving land, but virtually nothing has been spent on facilities to make use of the land or restores habitat degraded by years of unwise use or outright abuse. There are virtually no state facilities on the NJ side of the bay, no visitor centers, few parking areas and none with public facilities. There are three state parks in all of Cumberland, Salem and Cape May counties, but both Parvin and Belleplain are on small lakes inland from the bay and Cape May Point State Park is on the Atlantic Ocean. Ask why and you will walk a well-traveled path of excuses that miss the main problem: there exists on the Delaware Bay a wealth of natural resources that can’t be accessed by the people of NJ and few residents have gained from all this protection because there is virtually no economic benefit.
Belleplain State Forest
I am working with the American Littoral Society to help address these problems. We will work with state, federal, non-profit agencies to identify restoration projects that are both good for wildlife and the local economy. Although much of the Bayshore is wild, significant areas have been degraded by abandoned housing, bulkheading and other futile attempts to tame the relentless force of the bay. These degraded shorelines can be cleaned up and restored to useable beach habitat. Scattered throughout the bayshore are remnant dikes with derelict tide gates that could be restored and the flooded marsh managed for shorebirds, waterfowl and for people. Large sections of the rivers and creeks along the Bay are accessible only by boat, leaving many residents with little access or knowledge of their own land. This could be solved with parking areas, fishing piers and shoreline access. These projects would help wildlife and the people who enjoy wildlife watching, hunting, and fishing. The restoration and construction will bring new jobs to the bayshore and create new opportunities to make money when they are complete. This is how we can create a sustainable system of conservation.
Dike with functioning tide gate constructed by Cumberland County Dept of Public Works and USFWS in Greenwich, NJ
Old Collapsed dike on Pine Creek, Greenwich. A cooperative effort to restore the dike attacted $2million in funds but failed because of state agency permitting and financial management problems.
