Cedar Creek Campground in Berkeley to close; Ocean County to acquire land
BERKELEY - Ocean County has agreed to spend $5.9 million in open space tax money to purchase the Cedar Creek Campground off Route 9, a local attraction for more than 50 years.
Because the funds are earmarked for land conservation only, the 27-acre campground will permanently close at the end of the current season, said Commissioner Virginia E. Haines, liaison to the environmental program.
The Board of Commissioners approved the recommendation Wednesday from the Ocean County Natural Lands Trust Fund Advisory Committee to acquire the site from landowner Debra Fleming.
The acquisition will expand upon about 56 acres of existing open space that are already preserved around the campground site — such as the county’s Barnegat Branch Trail and William J. Dudley Park, which is owned by Berkeley, Haines said.
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The site buffers Cedar Creek, a 19-mile-long tributary of Barnegat Bay, which is a popular canoeing and kayaking destination that cuts through a portion of Ocean County’s Pine Barrens and serves as a natural boundary between Berkeley and Lacey townships.
The Cedar Creek subwatershed drains an area of 54.3 square miles in Berkeley, Lacey, Manchester and Waretown, and lies almost entirely within the Pinelands National Reserve, according to the Barnegat Bay Partnership at Ocean County College.
As part of the agreement, the county retains the right of first refusal should Fleming wish to sell an additional 5 acres adjacent to the campground, Haines said.
Berkeley Mayor Carmen F. Amato Jr. addressed the board during a public hearing on the resolution, explaining that had the land not been preserved, “it was sought after by development interests” that could have resulted in the construction of 100 to 200 new homes.
However, not everyone was celebrating the acquisition.
Jill Sidote, 54, a Stafford resident, explained to the board that her family had lived part-time at Cedar Creek for the past 45 years and she was disappointed that the county government could not continue to operate the site as a campground.
While the acquisition may be a win for the whole of Ocean County, it was a “loss for the people who spend their lives — half of the year — at that campground,” Sidote said.
For her and her summertime neighbors at Cedar Creek, Fleming’s decision to sell the property meant the loss of a second home, she said.
Commissioner Jack Kelly said the property was going to be sold “one way or the other, whether the county purchased it as open space or whether the owners sold it to be developed.”
This was the best possible outcome under the circumstances, Kelly said.
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Contact Asbury Park Press reporter Erik Larsen at elarsen@gannettnj.com.
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Cedar Creek Campground NJ closing; Ocean County to buy site
