Councilman Worries Negative Social Media Remarks Will Hurt Ocean City

An Ocean City councilman is urging social media posters to tone down – if not eliminate entirely – the harsh comments about vacant stores in the downtown business district.

Although many posters on Facebook have been blaming supposed high commercial rents for the vacancies, Councilman Keith Hartzell said that is simply not the case.

Hartzell brought up the critical social media comments at the March 27 Council meeting while contending they are unfair and threaten the reputation of the entire city.

“I get the pain some of this is causing our town. It’s wrong. So, I want everybody, all sides, to tone down the rhetoric and keep it to an honest discussion about the project,” he said.

In particular, Hartzell said the social media sniping has focused on vacant stores in the 700 block of Asbury Avenue in the heart of downtown. He refuted Facebook commenters who have been blaming the vacancies on excessively high rent rates.

“I can’t emphasize that enough,” he said of his belief that rents aren’t too high.

Hartzell characterized the 700 block of Asbury Avenue as being the target, or what he called “the victim block,” for the caustic comments on social media.

    Councilman Keith Hartzell wants the negative rhetoric to end on social media.
  

During the March 13 Council meeting, Hartzell pointed to seven empty stores on the 700 block of Asbury Avenue, saying that at least some of them looked “like hell.”

He wants the city to approve an ordinance that would require the owners of vacant stores to maintain their appearance until the buildings are rented out or occupied by new businesses. In the meantime, he hopes that the store owners would place some sort of decorative covering in the front windows to dress them up.

However, Hartzell reported at the March 27 Council meeting that the store owners on the 700 block of Asbury have since been making great progress with the empty buildings.

He praised some of the owners for sprucing up the storefronts, while noting that others are renovating or refurbishing the shops as they prepare to transition to new businesses.

“These people have been stepping up before any new ordinance,” Hartzell said in an interview about the owners improving the appearance of their buildings.

    The former Ruth's Hallmark shop has been closed for years and its fate remains unclear.
  

Among the seven, the former Sun Rose Words and Music store has just reopened as a new bookstore called Three Little Birds.

Meanwhile, the former Pappagallo women’s boutique is being renovated, the old Sea Oats store will be turned into a coffee shop and the former Wards Pastry shop is transitioning into a new business.

Plans are not as clear for the remaining three empty storefronts on the 700 block of Asbury. The former Ron Jon Surf Shop is looking for a new tenant, the fate of the former Beach Bike Warehouse is not immediately known, and the old Ruth’s Hallmark shop has remained vacant for about four years, Hartzell said.

Hartzell addressed each store and denied that the vacancies were caused by high rents.

“Supposedly, the naysayers are saying the rents are too high. Well, did they raise their own rent? I don’t think so, folks,” Hartzell said of the store owners.

Hartzell is intimately familiar with the 700 block of Asbury because he owns two buildings there that house the 7th Street Surf Shop and the Could Be Yours consignment shop. The businesses are not owned by him.

   The former Beach Bike Warehouse shop is up for rent.   

He speculated that the negative social media comments about empty stores were tied to support for a luxury resort hotel proposed on the Ocean City Boardwalk in place of the defunct Wonderland Pier amusement park.

The hotel project has also stirred up intense opposition, with some critics saying it will profoundly change Ocean City from a middle-class resort town into a vacation destination catering to wealthy visitors – in effect, pricing out a large segment of the tourism market.

Developer Eustace Mita has proposed building a 252-room luxury hotel, costing an estimated $135 million to $155 million, at the former Wonderland Pier site at Sixth Street and the Boardwalk.

The Boardwalk Merchants Association and Downtown Merchants Association have endorsed the hotel project, saying it will bring new investment and business to Ocean City.

Hartzell is pleading with hotel supporters and opponents to stop with their broader attacks somehow tying that project with the empty storefronts and supposedly higher rents in the downtown business district.

“If you don’t like the hotel project, talk about the reasons why you don’t like it there, but don’t go out and start attacking the whole town in either direction, whether it’s going to help or hurt. They shouldn’t be connected. Not at all,” he said. “All of us have to lower the rhetoric.”

    An architectural rendering depicts the proposed luxury resort hotel on the Ocean City Boardwalk.