VENTNOR – When your children ask what there is to do on a rainy day at the shore, you tell them, ‘Let’s go see were all the poopy goes.”
At least one 10-year-old boy summering in Longport was anxious to see the normally unseen system that keeps the plumbing working.
The Atlantic County Utilities Authority July 10 held a ribbon cutting at the Downbeach pump station located behind the Ventnor Educational Community Complex on Lafayette Avenue. The pump station, which recently completed a $5.3 million overhaul, moves nearly 3 million gallons of wastewater each day from Longport, Margate, Ventnor and Seaview Harbor in Egg Harbor Township to the ACUA’s wastewater treatment facility in Atlantic City where five wind turbines supply the electricity to operate the plant.
Ten-year-old Bryan Mattia, who goes to school in Cherry Hill, said he wants to be an engineer when he grows up. His mom, Sara Etsell, said her brother-in-law received an invitation to the ribbon cutting but was unable to attend, and suggested Bryan attend in his place.
“Bryan likes all kinds of machinery and seeing the ins and outs of the way things work,” Etsell said. “He asked me if this is where all the poopy goes.”
During his visit to the ribbon cutting, where most of the attendees were local public officials, city employees and ACUA staff, Bryan got to meet several real engineers, including ACUA President Matthew DeNafo and former NASA engineer and Margate Mayor Michael Collins, who encouraged him to keep up his interest in all things mechanical.
“My mom took me here because she thought I would like to see all this machinery,” Bryan said standing in front of one of the pumps that moves the wastewater from Downbeach towns, through oversized pipes below Wellington Avenue north to Atlantic City.
Bryan learned that the ACUA recently completed a complete rehabilitation of the station, which was built in 1970, including a new electrical system, wet well expansion, protective coating on pipes, new roof and exterior upgrades, and replacing other mechanical components that will improve the efficiency of the station and increase its resiliency during major flooding events. That includes installing a bypass system that would be put into operation should there be any problems with the system during an emergency.
When DeNafo asked which town he likes better, Bryan’s response was “definitely Longport.”
Mayor Tim Kriebel said the bypass pipe sticking out of the ground looked more like a piece of Marcel Duchamp artwork than a working mechanical system, that could replace Supercan as the ACUA’s next mascot.
Collins attended the tour with Public Works Superintendent Pat Power, the Ventnor contingent included all three commissioners, ACUA Board President Marvin Embry and Board Member Alex Marino, and Atlantic County Commissioner June Byrnes. Members of the ACUA’s community relations department made learning about wastewater enjoyable by distributing information about ACUA services along with rolls of toilet paper and oversized cookies decorated with wrenches and water droplets.
Ventnor Commissioner Maria Mento, who retired from the ACUA as its longtime chief financial officer, asked several questions about how the project was financed and introduced board members to local officials.
DeNafo said the entire project was engineered “inhouse,” which saved about $700,000 on an outside engineering contract.
“Our engineers are well-versed in this stuff,” DeNafo said. “We have an incredible staff at the ACUA.”
On the next cloudy Wednesday, Bryan said he may revisit the Jersey-Atlantic Wind Farm at the water treatment plant on Route 30, where five wind turbines supply the energy to keep Atlantic County’s critical infrastructure operational.
For more insight into ACUA operations, see acua.com.
The ACUA held a ribbon cutting on its newly restored Downbeach pump station in Ventnor, Thursday, July 10, 2025.
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