Sea Isle City mayor Leonard Desiderio and Avalon Mayor Martin Pagliughi, will flip coins to determine which of their communities will receive sand first from a beach replenishment project that will reconstruct eroded beaches of both seashore towns. The project is contracted to run from the beginning of May through the end of June with both islands receiving sand. The specially made coins have logos of Avalon and Sea Isle on each side. Two coins will be use with each mayor flipping one coin. The first town to have both sides land face up is the winner and will get sand first. The coin flips will take place at 10 a.m. Wednesday atop the Ocean Drive Bridge that connects both towns. Tuesday Apr. 20, 2010. (Dale Gerhard /Press of Atlantic City).
By BRIAN IANIERI, Press of A.C. Staff Writer | Tuesday, April 20, 2010
The mayors of Sea Isle City and Avalon will determine who gets new sand first by flipping coins today on the Townsends Inlet Bridge, neutral territory connecting the two barrier island municipalities.
The winning municipality will see its beaches replenished in May. The other will wait a month for new sand.
Mayors Leonard Desiderio of Sea Isle City and Martin Pagliughi of Avalon are using the friendly game of chance to promote their respective municipalites, which have competed for tourist dollars nearly every year since they were founded.
“This is the most anticipated thing to happen this winter,” Desiderio said. “It’s the Super Bowl of sand.”
Island Trophies in Wildwood specially made the two coins with Sea Isle City’s logo on one side and Avalon’s on the other. To eliminate a fluke victory, the winner’s logo must appear heads up on both coins, or the mayors will flip again.
Desiderio and Pagliughi will bring the coins to their respective churches for morning Mass today in case a higher power wishes for a fortuitous wind gust.
“The Las Vegas odds makers are going to be checking the weather,” Desiderio said.
Fate rarely determines such issues.
But the 50/50 odds seemed the fairest way for both mayors to settle the issue, which arose last year after the municipalities partnered on a $10.4 million project to stock 1.2 million cubic yards of sand on beaches decimated by fall and winter storms.
With no federal or state money earmarked, both tourism-reliant towns were desperate to rebuild beaches and protective dunes that in some cases have 10-foot-tall sand cliffs that drop straight to the tide line.
Illinois-based Great Lakes Dredge and Dock Co., which is finishing a beachfill project in Ocean City this month, said either Avalon or Sea Isle City could go first as long as their permits are in order at the time.
Work is expected to start in May.
The beachfill will suck sand from the floor of Townsends Inlet through gigantic tubes and pump it onto the shoreline, requiring several blocks of beaches to be closed temporarily.
For the municipality that goes first, the beaches will be stocked with sand when tourists start arriving.
All work for both municipalities must be finished by July 1, Avalon spokesman Scott Wahl said.
Competition is nothing new for these municipalities. The mayors play each other in bocce – an Italian form of horseshoes – each October. Sea Isle City, has won six years in a row, Desiderio said.
Sea Isle City will receive 700,000 cubic yards of fresh sand between 73rd and 94th streets at its southern end. Avalon will receive 500,000 cubic yards between Ninth and 26th streets at its northern end.
“The beaches took a monumental hit,” Wahl said. “It’s always safety before suntans.”
In Avalon, some northern-end beaches, including those around 12th and 13th streets, are blocked off by fences because of sharp cliffs and uncovered rocks.
“The beaches were just ravaged (this winter),” said Tom Sanders, 50, of Cape May Court House, who was surfing in the 51-degree water Tuesday afternoon in Avalon. “In 30 years, I’ve never seen this many storms so close together.”
Sanders suggested that instead of a coin flip, the municipalities should have had their beaches surveyed to determine whose was in the worst shape.
“None of us have seen anything like this,” said Ron Anzalone, 64, of Avalon, who also was surfing.
Meanwhile, at the 78th Street beach in Sea Isle City on Tuesday afternoon, Pagliughi and Desiderio practiced with a trial coin flip.
When Sea Isle City’s logo appeared heads up on both coins, Desiderio shouted, “We win. Yes!”
There was disagreement on whether the practice result was a sign or a jinx.
However, there was one thing both municipalities could agree on come the coin flip at 10 a.m. today at the apex of the Townsends Inlet Bridge.
“If it lands on its edge, Stone Harbor’s paying for the whole thing,” Avalon Business Administrator Andrew Bednarek joked.