$23.9M Referendum Question Before Point Pleasant Beach School Board

POINT PLEASANT BEACH, NJ — The Point Pleasant Beach Board of Education is scheduled to vote Tuesday on a resolution to move forward with a referendum for a package of facilities projects for the district's schools.

The public session of the meeting is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. in the auditorium at G. Harold Antrim Elementary School, 401 Niblick St. Tuesday's meeting is a change of date from the originally announced schedule, district officials said.

Superintendent William Smith said the resolution question is slated to be presented to the public at a special election, which will be held Dec. 12, according to the state Division of Elections.

District officials presented the preliminary look at the $23.9 million package in April (it can be reviewed here). It includes new boilers at Point Pleasant Beach High School, a new fire alarm system at G. Harold Antrim Elementary School, alterations and updates to existing classrooms, new LED lighting, and repairs to the building at Antrim.

The package also includes a proposal to build new tennis courts at Antrim — and the removal of badly deteriorating courts at the high school — as part of an expanded athletic complex at the elementary school. The football field would be replaced with a turf field, and the district would build a combination field house and education center. Read more: Point Pleasant Beach Schools $23.9M Referendum Projects: First Look

Tuesday night's discussion is anticipated to include information on how much of the project was deemed eligible for funding of up to 40 percent from the state Department of Education's Office of School Facility Projects. How much the state will fund affects how much money will needed to be bonded and how it will impact property taxes in the borough.

The proposed field house and turf field have been criticized by some in the community as unnecessary, and as being proposed solely to draw more tuition students to the district, which has seen enrollment decline in recent years.

Smith has said the proposed spaces are a response to needs in the community, including persistent requests for basketball court space that the district frequently has to turn down. The field house would include a public space for meetings, which is sorely lacking in the borough, he said.

"We have no place to hold the meeting," Smith said. "We're scrambling. That red trailer, we bought it on eBay so we would have a meeting room temporarily. That was five years ago."

Smith said the tennis court repairs are costly — resurfacing would cost $100,000 — and said the money would be better spent on new courts that would also be lined and useable for pickleball. Pickleball interest has been growing by leaps and bounds and towns all over have been converting or adapting tennis courts to accommodate the sport.