Amethyst beach motel in point pleasant
Amethyst Beach Motel in Point Pleasant

Point Pleasant Mayor Seeks to Demolish Motel Police Chief Says is Haven for Illegal Activity

by
March 17, 2021
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POINT PLEASANT, NJ – If you check out the Amethyst Beach Motel in Point Pleasant on travel website review pages, it’s pretty much everything you would expect from a Jersey Shore motel. It has decent reviews, complaints about cleanliness, and minor inconveniences, but you would never expect the mayor of the seaside borough would be seeking to raze it and create a parking lot in the tightly packed borough.

Many of the comments online about the motel are rave reviews about fulfilling family vacation memories. It’s the Jersey Shore.  The entertainment industry has a five-month window to book rooms and nobody comes here expecting 5-star service.

In the winter, like many other motels at the Jersey Shore, after the tourists are gone, they are converted into seasonal housing, sometimes for Section 8 recipients.

Point Pleasant Mayor Paul Kinatra wants it gone and the borough council introduced an ordinance to make it so.  The government of Point Pleasant, struggling to maintain their identity as one a family-friendly destination at the Jersey Shore is seeking to condemn the motel and take it through eminent domain.

There are conflicting reasons given by township officials.  Kinatra’s ordinance doesn’t say why the township wants the property, other than to create a parking lot, but Police Chief Joseph Michigan said the transient population that occupies the hotel during the off-season brings with them their drug addiction and illegal activities.

The motel owner, Bob Fernicola said in a post on their Facebook page they’re not giving in to Kanitra’s power move against the business.

“We are pushing forward regardless of attempts to replace this with a parking lot. We are pushing forward,” he said. “As we proceed with the application and process of refining a New Hotel. We are renovating the existing property and rooms. We have already begun on the rooms, and as soon as the weather breaks we intend on providing a more attractive and up-to-date exterior.”
Fernicola said the pressure the mayor is putting on his business is making an already difficult time more difficult.
“This has been a tough year however we will all get through it and we intend to make the existing Motel as good as it can be until such time as our community government grants us permission to replace this facility with a new vision,” he said. “My family is committed to the best interest of Point Pleasant Beach as we enter our sixth decade in business and 70 years of summering, living, and raising children here.”
Kinatra is under fire by residents who in 2021 saw their town become a party town filled with rowdy crowds and sociopolitical rallies and protests.  Residents are pressing Kinatra to keep the unwanted elements out while maintaining the town’s reputation as a family-friendly Jersey Shore vacation destination.

 

 

 

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