{"id":22014,"date":"2023-04-18T02:17:24","date_gmt":"2023-04-18T06:17:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/?p=22014"},"modified":"2023-04-18T02:17:24","modified_gmt":"2023-04-18T06:17:24","slug":"ocean-county-beach-replenishment-held-up-again-will-be-re-bid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2023\/04\/ocean-county-beach-replenishment-held-up-again-will-be-re-bid\/","title":{"rendered":"Ocean County Beach Replenishment Held Up Again, Will be Re-Bid"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script id=\"c3ac9e74cec94d25a1228e2039a9a2a8\">(new Image()).src = 'https:\/\/capi.connatix.com\/tr\/si?token=e6ca17a0-9f6c-402e-8f17-7db2585f0eb0&cid=209cb62d-f20d-41b1-885d-a317d66dc464';  cnx.cmd.push(function() {    cnx({      playerId: \"e6ca17a0-9f6c-402e-8f17-7db2585f0eb0\",      mediaId: \"14282d2e-0812-4b1e-8599-40f17ecdf877\"    }).render(\"c3ac9e74cec94d25a1228e2039a9a2a8\");  });<\/script><\/p>\n<p>Ocean County\u2019s long-awaited beach replenishment project, led by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, has run into another delay.<\/p>\n<p>The project was originally expected to begin as early as fall of 2022, but ran into delays as municipalities on Ocean County\u2019s northern barrier island balked at what became known as the \u201clocal share\u201d of beach replenishment costs. The $60 million project will renourish beaches between Point Pleasant Beach and South Seaside Park, with special attention and re-engineering efforts focused on Ortley Beach, Normandy Beach and a number of other areas where localized beach erosion has caused issues since the initial project restored beaches after Superstorm Sandy.<\/p>\n<p>After months of wrangling over costs, the project was placed out to bid by the federal government, however the offers were rejected by procurement officials.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe held a bid opening, but the bids came back too high to award a contract at this time,\u201d said Stephen Rochette, spokesman for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Philadelphia District, which holds jurisdiction over Ocean County. \u201cWe\u2019re working through next steps and hope to have an update soon on awarding a contract.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The re-bid is the latest delay in what has been a financial saga relative to the project.<\/p>\n<p>While the federal government allocated about $30 million to fund half the project, the bulk of the \u201clocal share\u201d fell to municipal governments, including what would have been a $2 million bill for Toms River taxpayers alone. Pleas by local mayors asking the state to utilize billions of dollars in unused federal infrastructure funding to go toward beaches went largely unheard, with local officials arguing that beaches generate tens of billions of dollars in sales tax revenue for Trenton each year while municipal governments are often left with the cost of managing beaches. Ocean County eventually pledged to cover half of each town\u2019s \u201clocal share\u201d before ultimately agreeing to fund the entirety of the local share for the island municipalities.<\/p>\n<p>Until finance agreements were approved by each municipal government, the federal government was unable to place the project out to bid. As explained by Rochette, the proposals from contractors simply came in too high.<\/p>\n<p>There are generally just two companies that bid on major dredging and beachfill projects: Weeks Marine, and the Great Lakes Dredge and Dock Company. Both companies have performed beach replenishment projects on Ocean County\u2019s two barrier islands. Demand for the companies\u2019 vessels are high, and emergency dredging after storms in other locations \u2013 and occasionally international demands \u2013 can push back scheduled non-emergency projects.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_12130\" style=\"width: 1010px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298.jpg\" data-rel=\"lightbox-image-0\" data-rl_title=\"\" data-rl_caption=\"\" title=\"\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-12130\" class=\"size-large wp-image-12130\" src=\"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"Equipment set up at Brick Beach III for a beach replenishment project. (Photo: Daniel Nee)\" width=\"1000\" height=\"750\" srcset=\"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-240x180.jpg 240w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-400x300.jpg 400w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-560x420.jpg 560w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-80x60.jpg 80w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-100x75.jpg 100w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-180x135.jpg 180w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-238x178.jpg 238w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-640x480.jpg 640w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298-681x511.jpg 681w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-12130\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Equipment set up at Brick Beach III for a beach replenishment project. (Photo: Daniel Nee)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Last month, Great Lakes announced it had been awarded $138 million in federal projects, including a $28 million project to restore beaches between <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dredgingtoday.com\/2023\/03\/30\/gldd-gearing-up-for-the-avalon-beach-nourishment\/\">Townsends Inlet to Cape May Inlet<\/a>, and a massive $93 million contract to design and construct the <a href=\"https:\/\/oversightboard.pr.gov\/importance-of-dredging-carraizo-reservoir\/\">Lago Loiza (Carra\u00edzo) Dredging Project<\/a> in Puerto Rico. Its other projects will take the company to Boca Raton and Palm Habor, Fla. for smaller work orders.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Weeks Marine has launched a new hopper dredge which is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.marinelink.com\/news\/weeks-marines-new-hopper-dredge-goes-sea-504318\">undergoing sea trials<\/a>, and last week <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dredgingtoday.com\/2023\/04\/13\/hopper-dredge-magdalen-begins-the-duck-dredging-operations\/\">began a major project<\/a> in North Carolina\u2019s Outer Banks region. The company is also completing a contract to renourish beaches in Rehoboth Bech, Del.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fcbkbttn_buttons_block\" id=\"fcbkbttn_left\"><div class=\"fb-share-button fcbkbttn_large_button \" data-href=\"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2023\/04\/ocean-county-beach-replenishment-held-up-again-will-be-re-bid\/\" data-type=\"button_count\" data-size=\"large\"><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ocean County\u2019s long-awaited beach replenishment project, led by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, has run into another delay. The project was originally expected to begin as early as fall of 2022, but ran into delays as municipalities on Ocean County\u2019s northern barrier island balked at what became known as the \u201clocal share\u201d of beach [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12130,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Ocean County Beach Replenishment Held Up Again, Will be Re-Bid","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,20],"tags":[86,24,4484,1970],"class_list":["post-22014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","category-shore-environment","tag-beach-replenishment","tag-brick-nj-news","tag-featured","tag-u-s-army-corps-of-engineers"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/IMG_9298.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgt2Ft-5J4","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}