Mayor Nellis moved Council to be more conservative. They lowered spending. and protected existing business.
As people tried to make money anyway they could, Sea Girt passed its first comprehensive zoning laws, setting up the downtown business district along Washington and the Plaza. It limited any other business to near the two hotels. Miniature golf, which people had set up in a few empty lots in town and along the beach front at the Stockton hotel would be restricted in their opening hours. In the residential zone, two story homes would be the limit, specifically restricting ‘garage apartments’, and billboards were banned. Later rooming houses would be specifically banned in a separate ordinance, other than those already operating.
The Council passed an ordinance which formally established a police department to conform with standards around the state. It also cut the pay of the three regular policemen. As a consolation, the town purchased its first patrol car.
The Ford car used by most police departments in 31
The town had one Marshal from 1907 until the mid 1920s. They still had just two full- time employees, William Panz and James T. Enright. John Cornelius was still a special officer given his age, (he was 62 in 1931). Two additional “Specials” were brough on for summer and around Christmas time, because residents demanded people be stopped from driving into town to cut holly for house decorations. Some were selling the holly to earn cash.
The ordinance established positions of chief, captain lieutenant, sergeant, and three patrolmen, plus temporary or seasonal special officers, but did not mandate any of the positions be filled.
The fire company was restricted from attending to fires outside of a narrow boundary without special permission. It was felt that if a fire broke out in town while attending to a remote fire, Sea Girt would be unprotected. It also saved gas. With money tight, everything was subject to austerity.
36 years after establishing the post office in Sea Girt, the federal government finally agreed with Mary Blakey, the first postmistess, in 1895 and they conceded that there was no space in the name, and Sea Girt was no longer Seagirt in the postal system.
Lifeguards saved John Nelson of Princeton on the 4th of July, and the admission system for the beach was in full swing with revenues over $2,100 for the first two weeks of summer.
The town also passed an ordinance in cooperation with Spring Lake to build a true outfall pipe and manage the spillway at Wreck Pond, fixing and closing the Inlet permanently.
Panz and Enright in front of Boro Hall in the early 30s (SG PD)
When the Point Pleasant Canal opened connecting Barnegat Bay to the Manasquan River, it was an ecological disaster. The river’s fresh water destroyed the bay’s salinity and shellfish beds. The diverted river water also permanently closed the shallow, winding Manasquan River inlet at the ocean, robbing Sea Girt and points north of sand. The fishing fleet at Union Landing and Point Pleasant were stranded without ocean access for four years.
The re-opening of the River was celebrated in 1931 with a flotilla of small craft navigating the new waterway. The State, County and Federal Government had put up the money. More work would be done, with granite rocks from blasting of the New York subway system keeping the channel open, but the fishing fleet were back, and the sand from the river, despite its diminished flow, would help stabilize the beaches in Sea Girt.
Aerial photo of the outlet to the Manasquan River before the rocks were installed
Stones from the NY City subway were used to line the river and hold its position at the inlet