Donald Wittkowski

The Ocean City Community Center, a multifaceted municipal complex that serves hundreds of thousands of visitors each year, is getting a new heating, ventilation and air-conditioning system that will cost nearly $800,000. “The existing HVAC system reached the end of its useful life. This is a routine replacement of aging equipment,” city spokesman Doug Bergen said in an email Friday. City Council has awarded a $769,600 contract to Falasca Mechanical Inc. of Vineland for the project. Work is expected to be completed by the summer, Bergen said.

A sign attached to a chain-link fence at the corner of 16th Street and Simpson Avenue in Ocean City strongly suggests it is inevitable what is going to happen to the surrounding property. “22 LOT SUBDIVISION,” it blares in capital letters. “3 lots under contract.” The sign also notes that the housing lots are selling from $599,000 to $749,000 and that settlement is expected in the spring of 2020. The housing project proposed for the entire block of land bordered by 16th and 17th streets between Simpson and Haven avenues follows an unsuccessful attempt by the city to acquire the land in 2019 for $9 million. But now the city has renewed negotiations with the land owner, Klause Enterprises, in a second attempt to buy the sprawling property before it is developed for homes.

Stephen Barse remembers riding his bike up the Ocean City-Longport Bridge on Labor Day weekend, but everything else is a blank. When he reached the top of the bridge, he collapsed from a heart attack and was lying motionless on the shoulder of the roadway, just out of the way of traffic. He was dying. Among the people who rushed to his aid were two Ocean City police officers who had a defibrillator to restore his heartbeat. Barse, 61, recalled his brush with death on Sept. 1 during remarks Monday at Ocean City’s last City Council meeting of 2019. He came to the meeting simply to express his thanks to the police officers for saving his life – and to the city for having the foresight to equip the police department with defibrillators.

A mini-city is taking shape on a stretch of Ocean City beach that is normally deserted in the dead of winter. Construction trailers, bulldozers, earthmovers, excavators, mountainous piles of pipes and workers wearing hard hats crowd the shoreline on the beach between 58th and 59th streets next to Corson’s Inlet State Park. They are expected to be joined on Sunday by a dredge named “Illinois” that will be anchored in Corson’s Inlet to begin the process of pumping fresh sand onto the storm-eroded beaches in the south end of Ocean City.

People applying for public housing in Ocean City will no longer face a “One strike and you’re out” policy. The Ocean City Housing Authority voted Tuesday to loosen its admissions policies for people who have convictions for drug possession or a history of other non-violent criminal offenses. The authority would have risked losing funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and could have exposed itself to lawsuits if it had not made the change, officials said. HUD has been “strongly recommending” that local housing authorities across the country should relax their admission policies for former drug offenders or people with a record of non-violent crimes, said Jacqueline Jones, executive director of the Ocean City Housing Authority.

Ocean City police are paying extra attention to highway safety during the holidays because drivers often are not. Many times, motorists are focused on their Christmas shopping or holiday trips rather than the rules of the road, explained Lt. Brian Hopely, who heads the Police Department’s Traffic Safety Unit. “Driver safety is not always on the minds of people during the holidays. But law enforcement is out there making sure that everyone is adhering to all motor vehicle laws,” Hopely said. Police are on the watch for distracted, careless or reckless drivers as part of a holiday safety campaign that will continue through the new year.

It was just a small piece of history, but the impact on Gail Powell was huge. As she stared at the old Chinese silver coin resting in the palm of her hand, Powell uttered “absolutely incredible” as though she was looking at a priceless artifact. Her fascination with the coin really had little to do with its origins in China. She was more interested in the fact that it was part of the cargo recovered from the legendary Ocean City shipwreck, the Sindia. Powell and her husband, Bruce, who live in Bala Cynwyd, Pa., were in Ocean City on Saturday for a special presentation on the Sindia on the 118th anniversary of the shipwreck. “The Sindia is the biggest story in Ocean City, as far as shipwrecks go,” said local historian John Loeper, who serves as chairman of the Ocean City Life Saving Station museum.

Ocean City will have to wait longer to undertake a multimillion-dollar renovation of the Sports & Civic Center after bids for the project came in much higher than the estimate and were rejected. Four competitive bids from companies seeking the construction contract ranged from about $4 million to $4.6 million, well over the $2.5 million estimate by the city engineer. City Council voted Thursday to reject the bids. City officials intend to seek new bids, but the process could be lengthy. For instance, it took three months from the time the city advertised for the first set of bids and opened them in late November. “The length of the public bidding process can vary, but it’s never quick,” city spokesman Doug Bergen said in an email Friday.

Ocean City is making another attempt to acquire a coveted tract of land that Mayor Jay Gillian hopes to preserve as open space instead of having it developed into a housing project by the private owners. City Solicitor Dorothy McCrosson told City Council on Thursday night that a new round of negotiations has begun with property owner Klause Enterprises for the block of land bordered by Simpson and Haven avenues between 16th and 17th streets. “We’d like to move forward with acquisition as quickly as possible,” McCrosson said. Although the city would prefer to reach a deal to buy the property from Klause Enterprises, it is also keeping the option open to acquire it through condemnation if negotiations fail, McCrosson added.

The shore town that touts itself as “America’s Greatest Family Resort” is getting a new hotel that reflects the family-friendly market. Known as the North Island Inn, the all-suite boutique hotel is under construction on a prime spot only a block from the Boardwalk and will make its debut in the summer of 2020. “The goal would be the Fourth of July,” the hotel’s developer, Christopher Glancey, said of the approximate timeframe for a grand opening. “But we’re always weather-dependent.” Glancey spoke Tuesday during a bitterly cold afternoon that hardly evoked leisurely summer days lying on Ocean City’s sunny beaches. However, Glancey and his development partner, Bob Morris, have their eye on the calendar as they press ahead to have the hotel ready in time for the bustling summer tourism season.