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Resorts Casino Hotel, Atlantic City.

DONALD WITTKOWSKI Press of A.C.Staff Writer | Friday, Aug. 6, 2010

ATLANTIC CITY – A former top gaming executive who was unsuccessful in attempts to acquire the Trump and Tropicana casinos has emerged as a possible buyer for the financially ailing Resorts Atlantic City.

Confirming his interest in Atlantic City’s oldest casino, Dennis Gomes said he toured Resorts this week but stressed that he has no agreement to buy the Boardwalk property.

Related story: Lender wants to force Atlantic City’s Hilton casino into receivership

“I’m looking at it,” Gomes said in an interview. “I was all over the property, examining the place. But until we have a purchase agreement, I can’t say anything.”

In December, Resorts was taken over by a group of banks after it defaulted on its $360 million mortgage and faced possible foreclosure. Lenders led by Wells Fargo Bank now own the casino hotel and are trying to unload it.

TriMont Real Estate Advisors, an Atlanta company that has been working with the lenders, has the casino up for sale on its website. No price is listed. Eastdil Secured, a commercial real estate subsidiary of Wells Fargo, is helping with the sale. Officials with TriMont and Eastdil did not return messages seeking comment.

Gomes, who spent more than 30 years as a senior executive in the Las Vegas and Atlantic City gaming markets, has been on the prowl for a casino ever since he left Tropicana Casino and Resort in 2005 following a management shake-up. He fell short in attempts to buy the Trump Entertainment Resorts Inc. casinos in 2007 and was part of a group that made a bid for Tropicana in 2008 before billionaire investor Carl Icahn eventually acquired the gaming hall in a bankruptcy auction.

“I love Atlantic City, and everybody knows I’ve been interested in coming back to the city,” said Gomes, who is now a gaming consultant. “I want to show what my love, passion and marketing promotions can do. All I can say is that I want to be back because I love it.”

Gomes said he remains optimistic about the city’s future, despite a four-year revenue slump caused by the economic meltdown and intense competition from casinos in neighboring states.

Gov. Chris Christie wants to revive the casinos by creating a state-controlled tourism district to oversee the gaming and entertainment zones. Even before the governor unveiled his plan last month, Mayor Lorenzo Langford began holding a series of summit-style meetings with community leaders to discuss ways to reduce blight and make the city safer. Gomes is a member of the mayor’s planning group.

“I love what the governor is doing. I love what the mayor has been doing with the city, too,” Gomes said. “I think the combination of what the governor and mayor are doing and what I can do will help bring the city back to what it was in the ’20s and ’30s.”

Resorts, formerly known as Haddon Hall, is a hotel that dates to Atlantic City’s tourist heyday in the 1930s. The hotel was transformed into the city’s first casino in 1978, but despite its rebirth as a gaming hall, the building’s aged physical condition has been an expensive headache for its succession of owners over the years.

Wall Street analysts believe Resorts’ future is bleak. They say Resorts, the Atlantic City Hilton Casino Resort and Trump Marina Hotel Casino could be casualties of the fragile economy and competition from casinos in Pennsylvania, New York and Delaware.

“We believe that Atlantic City may experience the closing of two or more properties by year end 2011,” Andrew Zarnett, managing director of Deutsche Bank, warned in a recent research report. “The likely candidates that may shut down are Resorts, A.C. Hilton and possibly Trump Marina, as each of those properties continues to post negative operating income and lose market share every month.”

Lawrence Klatzkin, managing director of Chapdelaine Credit Partners, said Resorts is at “high risk” for shutting down if its finances do not improve.

Resorts warned in an April tax filing with the New Jersey Casino Control Commission that it has been suffering from “severe cash shortages” that could jeopardize its chances for survival while it searches for a buyer. Resorts posted an $18 million gross operating loss in 2009 and has seen its gaming revenue plummet nearly 17 percent through the first six months of this year.

Before the lenders took over, Resorts was owned by Colony Capital LLC, a private real estate investment company that bought the casino in 2001 for $140 million. Colony surrendered ownership when the lenders threatened to foreclose on the property.

Nicholas L. Ribis, Colony’s former partner in Resorts, agreed to manage the casino for the lenders while a buyer was sought. Ribis said shortly after the lenders took charge that he was interested in acquiring the casino. Ribis’ office said he was traveling Friday and was unavailable for comment.

A photo in a book about the lighthouse shows how the light looked in about 1900.

By BRIAN IANIERI, Press of A.C.Staff Writer | Wednesday, August 4, 2010

SEA ISLE CITY — The nonprofit group trying to save the 125-year-old Ludlam Beach Lighthouse is running out of time: Demolition is scheduled for the fall.

Now known as 3414 Landis Ave., the lighthouse has been a no-frills, six-unit summer rental for decades. Even those days of obscurity are numbered. On Sept. 13, the electricity will be turned off, the cable unplugged. The squat, nondescript building will never again see another summer tenant. By next year, it will be gone. To prevent that, the Friends of the Ludlam Beach Lighthouse are considering nearly anything to save the building, including potentially finding a place for it in another municipality.

“It really belongs on Ludlam Beach,” said the nonprofit group’s founder, Bob Uhrmann, 61, sitting at the kitchen table at 3414 Landis Ave. in Sea Isle City. “But as long as it stays out of a landfill, I don’t care where it goes.”

The nonprofit group is far short of funding to move the structure.

Sea Isle City considered allocating $100,000 for the Ludlam Beach Lighthouse but scrapped plans earlier this year amid budget cuts and concerns that city ownership and further repairs could exceed $1 million.

The drive

Uhrmann, a middle school history teacher who lives in Upper Township, started the drive five years ago to save “The Forgotten Lighthouse” after he heard owner Charles Adams planned to rebuild.

Adams, 60, a retired plumbing instructor in Philadelphia, has owned the building since 1993 and continues to rent units weekly. Since 2006, Adams has said he would donate the building to be moved. Uhrmann does not fault Adams for wanting new construction.

Adams sent a letter to Uhrmann and city officials in July informing them he plans to turn off the utilities on Sept. 13.

“Any part of the building remaining after September 20, 2010, will be demolished and trucked to a landfill,” he wrote.

The city’s Zoning Board approved new construction in May to erect three homes on the large lot, city Construction Official Neil Bryne said. The property still needs a demolition permit, a certification that mainly ensures all utilities have been shut off, he said.

“It doesn’t look good at this point,” said City Councilman Michael McHale, who supported the idea of using city funding for the lighthouse.

Sea Isle City has offered the site of a former landfill on Fifth Street for the lighthouse group to place the building.

But Uhrmann said without the city backing the funding, the chances of saving the building have diminished.

Uhrmann said moving the building and putting in the piling will cost $50,000. His group has about $14,000, he said. Without city ownership to help secure grants, finding funding is difficult, he said.

“I’ve been doing this for over five years, and I don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel here,” Uhrmann said.

Meanwhile, Uhrmann is looking for people, organizations or even towns that might want a former lighthouse and would be willing to move and help restore it.

“We’ve gotten some interest from some people, but nothing concrete,” he said.

‘The Forgotten Lighthouse’

The postcard image of a beaming lighthouse on the shoreline exists in the imagination at 3414 Landis Ave., a stop on the New Jersey Lighthouse Challenge last year.

The only clue of its past is a sign in a first-floor window saying so. Inside are thick baseboards and heavy oak windows.

The Ludlam Beach Lighthouse has no tower and it has no light. It has been a residence since the 1920s. Built in 1885, it is among the oldest buildings in the city.

Phil Bur III, a lighthouse buff with a summer home in Sea Isle City, first saw Sea Isle City’s lighthouse on a map of New Jersey lighthouses. Like many, Bur had never heard of it.

“There was a steel tower with a light on top was all anyone could remember, and that was built in 1924. Nobody even remembered the old original lighthouse,” he said.

The steel tower replaced the Ludlam Beach Lighthouse and remained in Sea Isle City until the 1960s.

In the 1990s, Bur began researching archives of the lighthouse, its locations and its keepers.

City founder Charles Landis swayed the federal government to build it after providing a list of shipwrecks off Sea Isle City’s coast, said Bur, who wrote a history of the lighthouse.

The lighthouse was taken out of service in 1924 and stripped of its Fresnel lens. The lighthouse’s revolving oil lamp was replaced with a 40-foot steel tower with a flashing gas light.

“The old Sea Isle City lighthouse, which for 44 years guided mariners along the coast, will be abandoned and the building, one of the first on the island, will be dismantled and sold to the highest bidder for the material it contains,” read a 1924 article in the Seven Mile Beach Reporter.

The building was moved from the beach to 31st Street and Landis Avenue and made into a residence. It was moved again in the 1940s to its present location.

Christine Everly, 33, of Warminster, Pa., is the owner’s daughter. She spent 17 summers at the shore home in Sea Isle City. Her three young children know the history, too.

“It was neat. It always gave us something to talk about when we went out. Even my kids know, ‘We live in a lighthouse.’”

Everly said repairs at the building grew more expensive each year.

“It’s not the prettiest of places, but it can be pretty once it’s back to the original,” she said.

‘Divine intervention’

Hugh McCauley, a preservation architect involved in Sea Isle City and with the Hereford Inlet Lighthouse restoration in North Wildwood, said the lighthouse has enough of the original documentations, plans, photographs and drawings to bring it to its former glory.

“I think the building deserves a chance,” he said.

To the north and south of Sea Isle City are encouragements to Uhrmann and the Friends of the Ludlam Beach Lighthouse.

In North Wildwood, the Hereford Inlet Lighthouse was restored and opened in the 1980s after being used for storage for nearly 20 years.

In Ocean City in March, Ocean City approved a $958,000 bond to buy the Ocean City Lifesaving Station at Fourth Street. After a decade of debate and lawsuits, Ocean City purchased the property shortly before it could have been demolished.

In Sea Isle City, Uhrmann still sees hope for 3414 Landis Ave., although it might not be in the city where it was built.

“All we need is a little divine intervention and we’re set to go.”

The building at 3414 Landis Ave. in Sea Isle City has been used for summer rentals for years.

Bob Uhrmann, left, and Christine Everly, of Warminster, Pa., daughter of current owner Charles Adams, talk in the kitchen of the former Ludlam Beach Lighthouse, where Everly is staying. Her son Tyler, 2, is in the back. Uhrmann’s group is trying to preserve the building, which will be prepared for demolition in mid-September.

By ERIK ORTIZ, Press of A.C. Staff Writer | Monday, July 26, 2010

The advent of energy deregulation in New Jersey nearly 12 years ago allowed electricity consumers to shop for the best rates and pick their own supplier. But the choices for alternate suppliers remained limited and only a small fraction of residential customers made the switch. Eventually, some suppliers left the state.

But newer companies have been expanding their operations in New Jersey in recent weeks, attempting to gain a foothold in the relatively untapped residential supply market.

“I guess it’s an opportunity that they see because of the economy,” said Karen Alexander, president of the New Jersey Utilities Association, which represents investor-owned utilities such as Atlantic City Electric and South Jersey Gas.

Some of the companies are promoting savings of between 5 percent to 20 percent over a year’s worth of electricity bills. Gateway Energy Services, based in Montebello, N.Y., has been mailing letters to New Jersey residents this month saying that its current electricity rates “are at least 15 percent below utility pricing.”

Karen Harris, corporate communications editor for Gateway, said the company’s push into New Jersey is favorable because consumers seem to be more open to finding other ways to save money.

Before April, the company was only certified to supply natural gas in the state. After gaining approval to supply electricity from the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, Gateway added 15,000 residential electric accounts, said Steve Varney, the company’s director of marketing.

So what has been its strategy in converting ratepayers?

“We like to use the model of: Remember when you couldn’t shop around for a phone carrier? But now you can,” Harris said. “Once we use that as a basic model of deregulation, they think, ‘Now I get it.’ Education is a top priority for us.”

Gateway operates in eight states and Washington, D.C. Its largest presence is in New York, where it has the equivalent of 350,000 residential customers, Varney said.

The number of New Jersey residents who use a third-party supplier has grown over the past two years. As of May, 6,594 residential customers in the territory of the four major electric utilities, Atlantic City Electric among them, belonged to an alternate supplier. That’s only 0.2 percent of the 3.35 million ratepayers within those utilities’ coverage area.

But it’s a huge leap from early 2009, when there were just 12 residential customers who belonged to another supplier, according to the BPU.

People who choose another supplier will still get their power delivered to their homes by their local utility, which will continue to be responsible for maintaining the power lines or restoring electricity when there are blackouts. The main difference is how a ratepayer’s bill might look: It would still show his or her local utility’s charge to deliver the electricity as well as the alternate supplier’s charge for supplying the electricity.

While Gateway does not charge a fee to join, it does require its customers to sign contracts, either a nine-, 12- or 24-month fixed-rate plan or a variable-rate plan.

A 12-month fixed-rate plan currently offers a rate of 11.38 cents per kilowatt-hour, which is below the 12.46 cents per kilowatt-hour of Atlantic City Electric’s average annual price. For consumers who use 10,000 kilowatt-hours over a year, Gateway says they could save $108.

Gateway cannot guarantee savings with a fixed-rate contract since Atlantic City Electric’s rate can change because it is based on fluctuating market prices.

“There are other times we unfortunately will be the same or above in the rate,” Harris said. “But we offer more than the utility can because you can lock in your price and it is not going to change.”

Breaking a contract with Gateway would cost $12.50 per month for every month or partial month that is outstanding.

Another licensed residential energy supplier in New Jersey, Viridian Energy, says it offers no contracts for customers. The Connecticut-based company allows people to sign up or cancel at any time. It began service in New Jersey in May, and uses a rate that may vary from month to month. Its current rate is 11 cents per kilowatt-hour.

Viridian is trying to distinguish itself as a “green” energy provider by offering power – 20 percent or more – that it says comes from renewable energy sources. The company also signs up customers through a network of independent associates who belong to Viridian’s direct selling program. The company does not actually charge consumers to sign up for its service.

“We’re not asking for a Social Security number. There’s no credit check,” said Alison Bradford, an independent associate from Estell Manor.

There are at least seven companies that are licensed as residential electricity suppliers in Atlantic City Electric’s service territory. Companies wanting to operate in New Jersey must provide audited financial information, proof that they have experience in the industry and membership with PJM, the operator of the regional power grid. Licenses must be renewed annually, BPU spokesman Doyal Siddell said in an e-mail.

In addition, the BPU verifies any claims about how much renewable energy a company might supply and also reviews the number of customer complaints with each company before a supplier’s license is renewed, Siddell said.

Greg Leap, a Linwood insurance broker, joined Viridian last month after doing some research on the company. He’s still waiting to see how much he can save with his July bill, but is so confident in the company that he became an independent associate as well.

“Everyone would like to go green, but very few people will pay more to do it,” he said. “But this way, it’s the best of both worlds.”

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Artist Rendering for Promenade redevelopment

By BRIAN IANIERI Press of A.C. Staff Writer | Tuesday, July 27, 2010 

SEA ISLE CITY — A prime beachfront lot vacant since a 1962 storm washed away a dance hall there is among the sites of a proposed $2 million project

City Council on Tuesday informally supported an architect’s plan to erect a band shelter at the empty lot off John F. Kennedy Boulevard and Pleasure Avenue, replace a gazebo on the nearby Promenade and change the streetscape and landscaping in the area.

The property belongs to Cape May County through its Open Space program. The county review board approved the city’s proposal on Tuesday afternoon, Sea Isle City Mayor Desiderio said.

“This will turn into a jewel to rejuvenate the city’s Promenade area.

not only for Sea Isle City but for Cape May County,” said Desiderio, who is also a county freeholder. “This will really be something special.”

Sea Isle City had long considered uses for the property and budgeted $2.4 million in a capital plan over the next two years, City Council President Mary Tighe said.

Architects Vince Orlando and Blane Steinman presented plans Tuesday for an open-air bandstand with a wood dance floor, concrete pavement and fixed benches. Much of the property will be an open lawn.

Orlando suggested the first phase of work — including the bandstand and gazebo — could start in November and be finished by May 1. The second phase, which addresses landscaping and utilities between Landis Avenue and the Promenade, could start in fall of 2011, he said.

The project would become a highly noticeable attraction in a city spending millions of dollars on an ongoing “beach-to-bay” revitalization effort to build attractions, a marina and walkways along the city’s main corridor of John F. Kennedy Boulevard. The heavily traveled boulevard leads from the Sea Isle City Bridge to the beachfront Promenade.

“This project’s going to make this town,” city resident Irene Jameson said.

The bandstand woulsd be built on a stretch of vacant land near the beach off John F. Kennedy Boulevard, a section of land with its own history.

The lot is dubbed “Excursion Park” but was called the Cospar lot for more than 30 years.

The land once held a dance hall in downtown Sea Isle City but was wiped away in the Storm of 1962, which ravaged New Jersey’s coastline. In the mid-1970s, a city redevelopment authority sold the land for $199,000.

The lot was slated for redevelopment into a hotel and convention center, but those plans fell through. Later, a controversial plan for a 53-unit condominium complex sprang up and met with public opposition.

In the early 1990s, Sea Isle City bought the land from Cospar Inc. for $2 million using a low-interest loan through a state Green Acres open space program. It was briefly used as a parking lot.

In 1998, Cape May County bought the property for its Open Space program and relieving Sea Isle City of the expense of its 20-year loan, Desiderio said.

Desiderio said he dubbed the area “Excursion Park” after an Excursion Hall, which stood there in the mid-1950s.

Since the 1962 storm, “There has been nothing on it,” Desiderio said.

The boardwalk pavillion at Roosevelt Place (with no roof) and the boarded up building at Lincoln Place (tan building) are eyesores. Governor Christie's report talks about the transformation and expansion of the Atlantic City Boardwalk into a more traditional New Jersey Boardwalk experience. Including development of the Lower Chelsea section of the boardwalk, downbeach from Albany Boulevard. Tuesdat, July, 26, 2010 ( Press of Atlantic City / Danny Drake)

By MICHAEL CLARK Press of A.C.Staff Writer | Friday, July 30, 2010

ATLANTIC CITY — What is the true New Jersey boardwalk experience? To Gov. Chris Christie, it’s something you can’t find in Atlantic City. Not yet, at least.

The governor’s bold plan to take over Atlantic City’s tourism management centers on how to remake the Boardwalk into a family-friendly destination to counter the adult entertainment the casinos have always provided, but the family-oriented entertainment industry might not be on the same page.

Christie’s plan, vaguely outlined in a report by his Advisory Commission on Gaming, Sports and Entertainment, includes focused initiatives such as developing the mainly residential Boardwalk in Lower Chelsea to support the broader effort to expand the nation’s oldest wooden walkway “to reflect a true New Jersey boardwalk experience.”

The report mentions the boardwalks in Ocean City and Wildwood as potential models for Atlantic City’s revitalized Boardwalk, including attracting the leading businesses in those cities to this resort. But whether those businesses would be willing to make the investment here is unlikely, several business owners said.

Gillian’s Wonderland Pier in Ocean City is one of the businesses that the Governor’s Office envisioned joining the new Boardwalk lineup, according to a copy of a conceptual map released last week. Jay Gillian, the pier’s owner, said that idea will likely remain a concept.

“If they want to try to bring something like an amusement park in, they need to find their identity first,” Gillian said of Atlantic City. “I know how hard it is to run an amusement park in this state. To start an amusement park in Atlantic City would be near impossible to really do it.”

Will Morey, owner of Morey’s Pier in Wildwood, said the same, arguing that if Atlantic City hopes to reinvent itself, it needs to focus on “being unique, not duplicating.”

“Having a carbon copy of Wildwood is not going to get the job done,” he said. “It’s not really an environment that encourages the development … Las Vegas tried to do the same thing, and we saw what happened to them. They had to go back and commit to what makes them Vegas with their ‘What happens in Las Vegas stays in Las Vegas’ (ad campaign).”

Some of the problems with establishing their businesses here, Gillian said, are not unique to Atlantic City. Strict state regulations and trying economic times would play a large role in keeping Gillian’s from expanding to the resort. But Gillian fears the clientele wouldn’t support multiple amusement parks.

“I know they have the Steel Pier there, which does well,” said Gillian, who also is Ocean City’s mayor. “But I think more than that might dilute it.”

Family fun in Atlantic City

Anthony Catanoso runs Steel Pier, located near the Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort. Although his property sits in a busy section of the Boardwalk and has attracted a healthy amount of business during each of the 19 summers he’s operated the site, he’s always fought to get the support of Atlantic City.

“Nothing frustrates me more than when people say there’s nothing for families to do on the Boardwalk. I pull my hair out,” Catanoso said. “We’re right under their nose and they don’t know it.”

The Steel Pier operator has been struggling to gain acceptance in Atlantic City, both with city officials and with Trump Entertainment Inc., which controls his company’s lease at the pier.

“The town was never receptive to us,” he said.

Catanoso’s only memory of city government officials lending a helping hand dates to the mid-’90s, when Ken Platt, the city’s Director of Planning under former Mayor James Whelan, assembled the Atlantic City Attractions Group, a small collection of family-based entertainment providers.

The group eventually developed a brochure, funded in part by the Casino Reinvestment Development Authority, to get the word out about the resort’s nongaming activities. But complaints about the brochure from those not included eventually caused the effort to fade away.

Development plans at Trump have kept lease agreements limited to two or three years, hampering Catanoso’s investment ideas. They include preliminary plans to construct a $4 million rollercoaster on the pier, the type of major family-oriented development that the Governor’s Office is striving for.

Catanoso said recent discussions with Trump since Christie’s Atlantic City visit have been positive and he is optimistic that a considerable extension could be reached.

But some say separating those two industries — the casinos and the family attractions — is a key to success.

“They’re not going to work hand-in-hand,” said John Siciliano, executive director of the Greater Wildwood Tourism Authority. “They would have to be two separate destinations.”

That means defining the Boardwalk first as a family destination and second as an access point for casinos. This could be the reason Christie’s conceptual maps put the “entertainment for all ages area” of the Boardwalk in Lower Chelsea, a residential area already removed from the casinos. The area features two blighted properties that recently ranked on Mayor Lorenzo Langford’s top 10 list of city eyesores.

Developing Lower Chelsea

The section, from Albany Avenue to the Ventnor border at Jackson Avenue, currently offers a mixture of older residential buildings, including homes and condominium high rises, most of them maintained, but some abandoned and dilapidated. There also is a collection of vacant lots, including the grassy tract meant to be The Breakers, a condominium project stalled by the national recession.

One of city government’s biggest failures in the area is the Boardwalk pavilion at Roosevelt Place, designed to be a spot where strollers can sit and take in the scenic ocean view. Instead, it’s become a rusted, skeleton-like structure where passers-by are more likely to shield their eyes.

“It isn’t anybody’s fault,” said Tim Mancuso, the city councilman who represents the section. “The pavilion just got caught up in the swing of different administrations.”

The councilman said he fully welcomes state assistance to redevelop the area and rid the section of the blight, but re-establishing it as a family entertainment district doesn’t seem plausible.

“I don’t think he’s talking about anything further down ,” he said of the governor. “Anything further down you really don’t have land.”

Radio personality and Press columnist Seymour “Pinky” Kravitz, who heads the city’s Boardwalk Committee, said he also opposes commercial development in the Lower Chelsea area.

“I don’t go along with that,” he said. “This sounds like someone that’s really not familiar with the Boardwalk.”

Custom Beachblock 4BR 3BA Townhouse in Townsends Inlet. One of the top beaches in the area. 3 houses from the beach with amazing decks thru-out. The inside of the property was renovated within the last few years. 3 full baths and 2 master bedrooms makes this an excellent rental property. New Designer kitchen w/ Granite tops. Owner offering Home Owners Warranty

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The Atlantic City takeover removes virtually all local control from the gaming district, from police protection to garbage pickup. At the same time the state is finally throwing in the towel on state-backed harness racing, which lost nearly $10 million last year.

The plans — reviewed by The Star-Ledger — were outlined in a report by a special commission created by the governor in February and charged with the task of deciding how best to fix the state’s faltering casino and horse racing industries.

The governor’s office put an advisory this afternoon saying only that Christie will announce the findings of the commission Wednesday at the Meadowlands in East Rutherford, and in Atlantic City, but provided no detail. A spokesman for the governor declined comment.

The recommendations, as outlined in the commission report, call for the most significant changes in New Jersey’s once lucrative entertainment, sports and gaming venues since casino gambling was approved and the opening of the Meadowlands in 1976.

Under the plan:

• Atlantic City’s entertainment and gaming districts would become an independent city within a city overseen by state government. That includes the casinos, the marina, beachfront and Boardwalk areas. Those parts of the city would all be put under the administration of a state authority directly answerable to governor.

• New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority would be all but disbanded, becoming simply a landlord for the facilities it now operates.

• The Meadowlands Racetrack could be sold for a token $1, or turned into an off-track wagering facility without live horse racing. The plan also recommends that the Izod Center arena be privatized or sold.

• In addition, the state would help re-finance the long-stalled Xanadu project in the Meadowlands, enabling a new developer to take control of the garish, high-visibility retail and entertainment complex alongside the New Jersey Turnpike that many consider an embarrassment.

• Financial aid to help complete Xanadu would be contingent on changing the building’s much-hated mutli-color exterior, and requiring that it be an entertainment complex, not simply another mall.

The recommendations were made by a seven-member commission headed by former sports authority chairman Jon F. Hanson, who ironically was one of the movers behind the expansion of the Meadowlands Sports Complex and the reach of the sports authority.

Previous coverage:

• Gov. Chris Christie plans review of N.J. sports, shows, gaming management

• Gov. Chris Christie to make sure N.J. sports authority stays afloat

• Gov. Christie creates oversight panel for struggling N.J. casino, sports industries

• N.J. Sports Authority seeks $30M state subsidy as losses mount

• N.J. Sports Authority audit is sought by lawmakers amid mounting debt

• N.J. Sports Authority faces $30M budget gap despite cuts to operations, payroll

• Sports Authority needs N.J. bailout funds to continue operations, state auditor says

• Star-Ledger Editorial: New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority’s time has passed. Let’s kill it.

Both Atlantic City casinos and the Meadowlands Racetrack have steadily been losing market share to out-of-state competition as gamblers are lured by places far closer to spend their money.

In recent years, Yonkers Raceway in New York added slot machines, becoming a “racino.” Foxwoods in Connecticut continues to attract players from New York and northern New Jersey. And just last week, casinos in eastern Pennsylvania began operating table games once exclusive to Atlantic City, including poker and blackjack.

Some legislators have long pushed to turn the Meadowlands — only about eight miles from Times Square and now served by a new rail line — into the new Atlantic City. There has been legislation introduced that would allow slots or video lottery terminals at the racetrack, as well as serious discussions about turning Xanadu, which was never competed, into a casino serving the metropolitan area.

But the Hanson report specifically rejects any expansion of gambling at the Meadowlands. The Atlantic City casinos and the 38,000 jobs they provide remain an economic engine for southeastern New Jersey, and the report argues that Atlantic City be given a chance to get better before consideration is given to gaming anywhere else in the state.

Left unsaid was that the only hope Christie had for getting Hanson’s recommendations enacted was to keep casino gambling in Atlantic City alone. Any move to put gambling in the Meadowlands would result in certain opposition from Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester), who could unilaterally kill any of the legislation needed. Sweeney and the rest of the South Jersey contingent in the Legislature are vehemently opposed to gaming licenses being issued outside of Atlantic City.

Instead, the play is being made to keep Atlantic City a major destination resort and in fact expand its entertainment and amusement offerings. The report calls for the revival of the city’s convention business, which has gotten little promotional assistance. Criticizing a generation of underinvestment in non-gaming activities, it also suggests adding family type amusement rides on the boardwalk, and possibly the addition of a NASCAR track.

The report, though, was highly critical of Atlantic City’s municipal government. According to the report, developers, businesses and casino companies are now wary of investing there while visitors are reluctant to come because of a perception that it is not safe.

The authority would take control of security, planning and traffic in the district, essentially becoming a city within a city. Boardwalk Hall and the convention center would be taken over by the district, while the Atlantic City Convention and Visitors Authority would be shuttered. Money from the Casino Reinvestment Development Authority, now shared throughout the state, would stay in Atlantic City.

The report also called for sweeping changes and updates in the state’s gaming regulations, mirroring them more closely on Nevada. Rules and laws need to be updated and eased based on changes in technology since the casino rules in New Jersey were first drafted a generation ago — before the explosion of computers and prior to the gaming industry being taken over by multi-national conglomerates based in far-flung locales.

The report calls for the near-dismantling of the sports authority, which currently operates Meadowlands Racetrack and the Izod Center, Monmouth Park Racetrack, the Atlantic City Convention Center, Atlantic City Boardwalk Hall and the Wildwood Convention Center.

Created by the Legislature in 1971, the authority is operating in the red this year, largely because of massive losses in horse racing, as well as funding lost with the closing of Giants Stadium. The old stadium had generated $20 million in income for the authority. Under terms of a deal with the Jets and Giants, however, the authority will see only $6.3 million in lease payments this season when the two football teams move to the privately operated New Meadowlands Stadium.

Under the plan proposed by the Hanson commission, the authority’s operations would be privatized through sale or lease, and the agency itself would become little more than a landlord. The Izod Center would remain open, but sold or leased through a bidding procedure, and operated by a private company.

The authority, which drew fire earlier this year after disclosures that it spent more than $1 million to secure seats in the new football stadium, will be required to sell its seat licenses by March of next year.

The report also recommends that the state offer the Meadowlands Racetrack to the Standardbred Breeders and Owners Association for $1 a year, or simply eliminating racing there and turning the facility into an off-track wagering hall. A project to build another OTW facility in Bayonne would be delayed, pending a final decision on the Meadowlands.

Monmouth Park, which runs thoroughbred horse racing in Oceanport and expects to lose $10.9 million this year, would be leased out or sold as well.

Xanadu, the stalled retail and entertainment complex next to the Izod Center, would also be revived under the plan.

The $2 billion facility — which features an indoor ski slope, skydiving wind tunnels, hundreds of retail shops and restaurants, and was to be crowned with the country’s tallest Ferris wheel — had been slated to open in 2007, but ran into financing problems and sits unfinished amid questions over the long-term viability of the project. Billionaire real estate developer Steve Ross and his investment partners have been in discussions with the Christie administration for months about possibly taking over the project, but wanted state financing.

Under the proposals put on the table by Hanson’s commission, the state would either put up its own bonding or federal Recovery Zone Facilities bonds, charging the debt against future tax revenue. In return for the financing, state would expect to get an equity position in the project. Financing would be contingent on the Xanadu exterior being redesigned.

If the Xanadu project is not put back on track by year’s end, the report said the state should proceed with foreclosure.

Some of what the governor is calling for can be done through executive orders, but must of it will require approval of the state Legislature — a process that could take time.

By Josh Margolin and Ted Sherman/The Star-Ledger

Michele and Bill Collins of Corbin City designed the family bedroom and sleeping porch for Windsong on Wesley, this year’s RNS Show House. The house, located in Ocean City, opens for tours on Saturday.

By BAILEY CLARK, For The Press of A.C. – Friday, July 9, 2010

Sometimes, interior-design perfection means working to the very last minute.

The smell of fresh paint was strong and the sounds of hammering and power tools filled the air as designers and crew members scrambled this week to put the finishing touches on “Windsong On Wesley,” the 19th Annual Designer Show House for the Ruth Newman Shapiro Cancer and Heart Fund which opens to the public on Saturday.

Twenty-one spaces in the turn-of-the-century Dutch Colonial house on Wesley Avenue have been transformed into minor works of interior-design art. The room treatments ranged from eclectic and dreamy to chic and subdued.

This is the first time Ocean City has hosted the show house. Charlotte Berger, publicity chairperson for RNS, said that they were hoping the location would bring many visitors to the event. “They have a lot of tourists in the summer, and we’re hoping that people will find it interesting,” she said.

Designer John Kelly, of Philadelphia, was still waiting for plantation-style shutters and shower doors to come in for his upstairs bedroom and bathroom on Wednesday afternoon. A girly space featuring upholstered walls and lots of white and pink, he described his approach as “a nice, airy, cool, beachy bedroom.”

“I have been with RNS for 19 years, and if there ever was a show house that I didn’t think was going to get done in time, this is the one,” said Kelly. “But, it somehow always manages to get done.”

Donna Tursi of Tursi Interiors LLC, based in West Chester, Pa., worked with Joseph Tenaglia, from Joseph Design L.L.C. of Wildwood Crest, to create the relaxing living room featuring neutral colors, starfish accents, nautical rope treatments on the walls and a unique mirrored fireplace. Tursi said that Tenaglia’s contemporary and avant-garde style meshed well with her own traditional approach.

“I tuned him down, and he tuned me up,” she said. Tursi was also waiting for more accessories to come in to complete the room.

Mary Dima, of Daroo Designs, collaborated with Meg Clemm, of Katy MacKenzie Designs, both from Blue Bell, Pa., to create “Surfside Soiree,” a lush and beautiful dining room featuring pastel colors, Louis XV chairs and a crystal chandelier.

“We did not want it to be typical beachy. We call it ‘elegant beachy,’” said Dima.

“We just tried to keep it serene and peaceful,” she added.

Visitors might find themselves daydreaming about living in the 4,500-square-foot privately-owned house, which is just as functional as it is stylish.

A soothing bedroom designed by Bill and Michele Collins, of Painted River Studios in Corbin City, includes white wood-paneled walls, a large painting of the ocean, and lots of blue. “We designed it to look like an old beach house,” said Michele Collins.

Collins envisioned visiting families with kids when designing the suite, which opens up to a sleeping porch with kid-sized custom beds with cubby holes underneath. A ladder leads to an attic playroom stocked with board games.

A tropics-themed sleeping porch makes creative use of a small space with a custom hanging bed suspended by rope and a bench with colorful, detailed upholstery.

“Sometimes small spaces intimidate people, because with a space so confined you wonder what you can possibly get from that,” said designer Beth Reale, who worked with Alicia Brown-Kosko on the room. Both designers hail from Interiors by Alicia, based in Williamstown. “I think we accomplished something very serene, very tropical, and a little rustic,” she said.

Visitors can take home more than interior decorating inspiration. On “Meet the Designer Night,” held every Thursday from 6 to 8 p.m., designers and vendors will be at the house to discuss their work. Furniture and accessories will also be available for purchase.

The $25 admission to the show house, which is available at the door, includes admission to a series of five lectures to be held on Thursday mornings, on topics ranging from health care to the history of Ocean City.

The house will be open through August 15th, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily. On Wednesdays and Thursdays, it will have extended hours until 8 p.m.

The proceeds from “Windsong on Wesley” will benefit AtlantiCare Regional Medical Center’s RNS Digital Mammography Van and the Cancer Centers at Shore Memorial Hospital and Cape Regional Medical Center.

For tickets and more information, visit www.rnscancerandheartfund.org

From Press of A.C. staff reports | Thursday, July 8, 2010

Joseph Romano Sr., owner of Sea Isle Ice Co., died Wednesday, several local officials and friends of the popular businessman said.

Assemblyman Jack Gibson said Romano, 73, was his “best friend,” and that he had just had lunch with him Tuesday and he seemed fine. Romano began feeling ill Tuesday night and sought medical attention Wednesday. He was being taken to a hospital in Philadelphia when he died, Gibson said.

“We were friends since we were kids,” Gibson said. “He was a pioneer in this town, a good businessman and a fair man. He will be greatly missed.”

Romano moved to the Sea Isle when he was 9, Gibson said, and he never left. Sea Isle Ice Co. got its start in Sea Isle in 1965, and branched out with a plant in Woodbine 20 years ago.

He was a member of various civic and business organizations, and at one point served on the Sea Isle Board of Education, Gibson said.

But while interested in politics, Romano never chose political sides, instead opting to help build up his communities, something he did first in Sea Isle and later in Woodbine.

Woodbine Mayor William Pikolycky said Romano was a huge asset to his community.

The company employs 75 people and operates 50 delivery trucks, according to its website. Pikolycky said Romano’s business provided many jobs to local residents.

“Joe was an outstanding member of this community,” Pikolycky said. “He believed in Woodbine, and he gave this town a lot.

“I’m going to miss him. I depended on Joe a lot for his insight.”