Business View Magazine | September 2020

282 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE SEPTEMBER 2020 MIDDLETOWN TOWNSHI P , NEW JERSEY Middletown Village. “We’re more of a large bedroom community and we don’t have a single downtown,” says Township Administrator, Tony Mercantante. “We have downtown nodes.” Today, the Township administration is focusing a great deal of energy on its Belford section, a census- designated place on the northeast tip of the Township off Sandy Hook Bay. “In our Belford section, we have a ferry terminal which goes to New York City,” notes Mayor Tony Perry. “This ferry terminal is right next to our Belford Seafood Co-Op, and this Township Committee, and Township Committees of the past, have been working for a long time to revitalize that area.” According to Perry, the project is a partnership between the Township, Monmouth County, the ferry operators, the Belford Seafood Co-Op, and the State of New Jersey, with the Township taking the lead role of instigator and organizer. “We all own a parcel and we all have oversight over some of it. But none of the property owners can develop the area on their own in a way that would be as lucrative as if you put it all together under one redevelopment umbrella and do it comprehensively,” he states. “We’re looking to build a community that incorporates not only the fishermen of Belford, but what we see as Middletown’s newest downtown and business sector” Perry continues. “We don’t have that downtown area but we have a large enough population to deserve one and that’s what we have envisioned for this great historic area. There’ll be residential, commercial, some outdoor recreation space, some open space, an entertainment area, and a parking structure to support the existing ferry terminal that operates there.” “The Belford Seafood Co-Op is a big part of our reasoning for doing this,” Mercantante adds. “That industry is struggling to survive, so we want to create some kind of an economic shot in the arm for them. They’re in the fishing