This article was published in the Philly Inquirer today…<\/p>\n
OCEAN CITY, N.J. \u2014 It was just after 8 a.m. Saturday when the Frenchy\u2019s crew arrived to make their beach landing. With a yoga class already spread out and a barefoot wedding wrapping up, it was high time to Frenchify the Music Pier beach.<\/p>\n
That meant setting up, before most people arrived, rows and rows of yellow plastic chaise lounges, each with a bright red-and-yellow striped Frenchy\u2019s-branded beach umbrella, and a handy Frenchy\u2019s menu attached, all for the potential amusement of visitors who might be willing to fork over rental fees.<\/p>\n
And while this might help some Jersey people pretend they are at a tropical resort \u2014 sans the frozen daiquiris that are still illegal in Ocean City \u2014 others are not amused.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThere\u2019s a reason there\u2019s never a line at Frenchy\u2019s,\u201d said a fuming Dawn Marie Jardel, a regular on the beach south of the Music Pier for 14 years, who shelled out $80 in beach tags only to find her beloved family beach had been taken over by a french fry company armed with an artillery of yellow chaise lounges.<\/p>\n
She and friend Kelli Ireland are so outraged at the Frenchy\u2019s chaise lounges monopolizing their beach they say they are boycotting Frenchy\u2019s French Fry store on the Boardwalk (formerly Curly\u2019s). And their children are on board!<\/p>\n
\u201cHow much beach do they need to take up with nobody renting the chairs?\u201d Jardel said. (Well not nobody, but lots of empty yellow loungers all around).<\/p>\n
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Does Frenchy\u2019s own the beach? <\/strong><\/p>\n Don\u2019t tell Frenchy\u2019s it doesn\u2019t have the right to stake out that large a portion of the beach for its concession.<\/p>\n As owner of the deed to the building now housing Frenchy\u2019s (formerly Curly\u2019s, which was moved several blocks away), the company can claim the obscure but pesky legal title to the beach to the high tide line, known as riparian rights.<\/p>\n Frenchy\u2019s it seems, may have the legal right to do whatever they want on what is arguably Ocean City\u2019s premier public beach adjacent to the Music Pier.<\/p>\n Because the company owns the building that runs along the Boardwalk from Frenchy\u2019s at Moorlyn Terrace to A Place on Earth a few doors down, its deed spells out that it also holds \u201criparian rights\u201d to the beach in front of that building.<\/p>\n Which brings up another question. Why are the Jardels and families like them paying $25 per person for a season beach tag for a beach owned not by Ocean City, but by a french fry company? Courts and legislation have upheld the public\u2019s beach access rights.<\/p>\n The city of Ocean City, besieged by complaints about Frenchy\u2019s, appeared to be raising the white flag, if not the Frenchy\u2019s flag.<\/p>\n The city said it would not counter Frenchy\u2019s claims to the sand.<\/p>\n \u201cThe business appears to be operating within its riparian rights,\u201d Ocean City public information officer Doug Bergen said Monday. \u201cThe mayor will not have any further comment on the issue at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n The Congo Falls connection<\/strong><\/p>\n The company that owns Frenchy\u2019s is no stranger to controversy. It is Adventure Golf South LLP, the same company that owns Congo Falls, whose expansion to Margate created an uproar and a lawsuit last summer<\/a>, according to manager Kevin Kelly.<\/p>\n Kelly says the company is still working out the details on how many chairs to set up ahead of time, but would not be deterred by the complaints.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re just trying to provide the same type of service that the beach has always had, with a little nicer upscale feel,\u201d Kelly said. \u201cWe\u2019re not there to take over the beach. We\u2019re trying to provide a different service. We don\u2019t want to ruin your experience.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re feeling it out right now,\u201d Kelly said, who had set up about 35 chairs in rows of 6 and was using an electric drill to insert umbrellas into the sand. \u201cWe don\u2019t want to take over the whole beach. We want to figure out how many chairs to set up.\u201d<\/p>\n Jardel, staring at a sea of empty yellow chaise lounges, worried about the changing flavor of the beach her family has claimed as its favorite for 14 years. Other regulars, they say, have abandoned their usual beach between 8th and 9th street and headed for the Frenchy-free 12th Street beach.<\/p>\n \u201cI was here before they started setting up,\u201d said Connie Nardiello of Washington Township, whose chair ended up perched at the edge of a sea of Frenchy yellow. “They were coming closer and closer. At first I thought it was something Ocean City was doing and thought how nice, first come, first serve.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a little commercialized,\u201d she said. \u201cPart of me is just let it be the beach. Let people bring their own chairs.\u201d<\/p>\n Needless to say, the people at Bert\u2019s umbrellas and chairs, whose much more sedate green sling wooden chairs and green and yellow umbrellas with no logo sit stacked by the dunes waiting to be rented out person by person, aren\u2019t too crazy about it either. (Though some other regulars note that Bert\u2019s cut into another longtime umbrella concession Surf and Sand.)<\/p>\n On Saturday, Bert\u2019s sent one customer under its green umbrella pointedly into the sea of yellow and red Frenchy territory. Frenchy did not object.<\/p>\n People at Bert\u2019s, a family-owned company that has been setting up umbrellas and chairs in Ocean City for 70 years, did not want to be quoted for the story.<\/p>\n Bert is renting umbrellas for $10 a day, chairs for $6.<\/p>\n Frenchy\u2019s is charging $10 a chair and $10 an umbrella, or $29 for two lounge chairs, an umbrella and a portable plastic safe to store belongings.<\/p>\n On Saturday, the vast majority of Frenchy\u2019s chaise lounges were unrented by mid-morning, but those who took advantage of Frenchy\u2019s \u2014 without knowing they were doing anything remotely controversial \u2014 seemed happy enough.<\/p>\n \u201cIs there not enough space on the entire beach?\u201d said Allison Brumer of Lititz, Pa. \u201cI\u2019ve never seen the beach run out of space.\u201d<\/p>\n She said she appreciated that Frenchy\u2019s chair set up left her with a little more space between the next group of beachgoers than when people are left to fill in at will.<\/p>\n \u201cI was like ooh, it looks like a resort,\u201d her friend, Michael Sole of Lancaster, said. \u201cIt\u2019s the size of a tennis court,\u201d he said of the Frenchy\u2019s compound. \u201cPeople complain about everything.\u201d<\/p>\n Toni McGuire, a local from Ocean City, said she\u2019d counted a set up of 98 chairs and 55 umbrellas over Memorial Day weekend and had been calling the Mayor\u2019s Office to complain about a private company\u2019s encroachment on what until this year was considered a prime public beach spot.<\/p>\n \u201cIt really gets junked up,\u201d she said. \u201cDon\u2019t put them all out on the beach, and then they\u2019re vacant.\u201d<\/p>\n Amy S. Rosenberg<\/strong> <\/a>| @amysrosenberg<\/strong><\/a> | arosenberg@inquirer.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This article was published in the Philly Inquirer today… OCEAN CITY, N.J. \u2014 It was just after 8 a.m. Saturday when the Frenchy\u2019s crew arrived to make their beach landing. With a yoga class already spread out and a barefoot wedding wrapping up, it was high time to Frenchify the Music Pier beach. That meant …<\/p>\n