Richard Helfant at the unveiling of the restoration of Lucy the Elephant last November.
By NANETTE LoBIONDO GALLOWAY
MARGATE Although she's survived on her own for most of her existence after being saved from the wrecking ball, Lucy the Elephant needs public support to ensure the city's greatest asset can earn enough money to take her far into the future.
Save Lucy Committee Executive Director Richard Helfant Thursday, Aug. 17 asked the Board of Commissioners to match the funds the committee has raised to build a visitors' interpretive center to meet the needs of the estimated 150,000 visitors who visit the National Historic Landmark every year.
Helfant brought the commissioners up to date on the progress made with the help of the prior administration over the last half-dozen years at the nation's most popular roadside attraction, and the committee's plans to accommodate the public in Phase 3 of Lucy's ongoing renovation project.
Lucy recently completed a $2.4 million exterior sheathing renovation funded with grants and donations.
We are very proud that in the 52 years the Save Lucy Committee has been in existence, we have never taken a penny from the city, Helfant said. We raise all the money ourselves, and the money that the city borrowed from Green Acres for the snack bar, the Save Lucy Committee repaid with interest in full.
The new phase of improvements includes interior renovations of the 3.5 story elephant that welcomes visitors who climb the stairs inside her legs to the top of her howdah to enjoy views of Absecon Island and the Atlantic Ocean.
The interior restoration project will be funded in part with a $750,000 grant from the New Jersey Historic Trust, but funding to build an interpretive center for people with disabilities who are unable to climb the steep and narrow staircase will be funded through a capital campaign the committee hopes will also be supported by taxpayers.
Lucy does not have public access restrooms, is not and can never be ADA compliant, and the store is way too small to handle the 150,000 people who visit every year, Helfant said.
Lucy the Elephant Visitors Center concept plan.
The building will serve as an interpretive center where video tours can be held. Having onsite restrooms will enable busloads of school children to visit Lucy during the school year, and allow meetings, parties, and events to be held inside the building.
The committee revised plans and scaled back the project to accommodate residents of Ivory Beach Condominiums next door to Josephine Harron Park where Lucy stands watch over the beach. The original plan would have erected the visitors' center 6.5 feet above grade, but the revision puts the building 4.5 feet above grade and preserves residents' views of Lucy and the beach.
The Margate Board of Commissioners in January approved the committee's plans to demolish the Lucy Gift Shop, which no longer meets Lucy's needs, and replace it with a new ADA-compliant two-story building, which will include more retail space, an interpretive center, meeting room on the second floor, restrooms, storage space, handicapped access ramp and an elevator. The historic Train Station building will be moved to another corner of the park to display railroad memorabilia.
Helfant said the committee plans to start construction by March 2024 and finish by Memorial Day 2025. Lucy the Elephant will be open for tours throughout the construction period. He previously said the committee would not go out to bid for the project until all funding has been secured.
The snack bar, which was built using Green Acres funding in the 1980s, was leased this summer as The Other Lucy snack bar. It provides teens with disabilities the opportunity to work their first job.
The snack bar no longer provides a sufficient revenue stream to keep Lucy in the pink like it did before Hurricane Sandy, and the building needs to go, Helfant said.
Removing the beach grill will create open space, make Lucy visible from the beach and provide an opportunity to return a one-block section of the city's historic boardwalk, which washed away in a storm.
We will be happy give it the city if they want it, and move it perhaps to the ball fields or some other public area, Helfant said, or we can auction it off to get some funding for the next project.
SOSH Architects of Atlantic City have designed the building, estimated at $3.5 million. Other funding sources could include a $500,000 commitment from U.S. Sen. Corey Booker's appropriations, and impact funds from a future round of the Orsted's Ocean Winds project, and a grant from the NJ Historic Trust.
We plan to invest another $1.5 million of our money into the building, and we are looking for the City of Margate to match what we put in, Helfant said. After all Lucy, the site, the buildings are city-owned assets that the city has never put any money into&It's time for the city to join us and match what we're going to put in to finally make that park equal to what Lucy is, and have a visitors' center the city can be proud of.
Although commissioners did not weigh-in on the request at the meeting, Administrator Ken Mosca said when they decide, funding could be included in future capital bond ordinances.
Proposed first floor layout.
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