Belmar adopts stricter Smoking Restrictions on Beach

Belmar’s Mayor and Council voted unanimously on May 27, 2009 to tighten Belmar’s restrictions against smoking on Belmar’s boardwalk and beaches.

The new restrictions reduce the size of the designated smoking areas on Belmar’s beaches to areas that will be at least 20-by-30-feet in size, and somewhat larger on Belmar’s busier beaches. These designated smoking areas, an example of which is pictured above, will be provided on beaches at Second Avenue, Third Avenue, Fourth Avenue, Fifth Avenue, Eighth Avenue, Ninth Avenue, Eleventh Avenue, Thirteenth Avenue, Fourteenth Avenue, Fifteenth Avenue, Seventeenth Avenue, Eighteenth Avenue and Twentieth Avenue. These are the same locations where smoking was previously permitted, only smaller in size and are located close to the boardwalk. The smaller designated smoking areas are designed to make the restrictions easier to enforce, and to reduce the amount of cigarette litter on Belmar’s beaches.

In 2001, Belmar became the first town in the continental United States to prohibit smoking on sections of its beaches as a way to combat the enormous litter problem caused by those smokers who dispose of their butts in the sand. Although the Borough grooms its beaches every night with a tractor-pulled mechanical beach rake that picks up larger items of litter, cigarette butts are too small to be picked up by the machine. Because each butt can take more than 10 years to degrade, cigarette litter continues to accumulate and consistently ranks each year as the number one form of litter found in annual beach clean-ups.

Under Belmar’s 2001 ordinance, which prohibited smoking on the beach and boardwalk except where designated, the Borough limited smoking by installing signs permitting smoking within 50-feet of the sign certain beaches.

. The effect of that approach was to create 100-foot-wide long areas stretching from the boardwalk to the water on each of Belmar’s thirteen bathing beaches where smokers were allowed to light up. These designated smoking areas were separated by 400-wide areas where smoking was prohibited. The result was that about 80% of Belmar’s beaches were made off-limits to smokers.

Police found it difficult to enforce the restrictions under the prior approach because the smoking areas were not clearly delineated. Similarly, although the prior approach reduced areas where smoking was permitted, large areas of the beach continued to be plagued by cigarette butt litter.

The new restrictions represent a compromise approach to the complete ban against smoking on the beach and boardwalk that had been advocated by the Belmar Environmental Commission during a presentation made before the Mayor and Council early this year. The Mayor and Council held a workshop hearing on Saturday, February 21, 2009 devoted to this topic that was attended by approximately 50 people.

Under the new restrictions, the designated smoking areas will be reduced in size to at least 20-by-30 feet in size, clearly demarcated by a plastic chain or rope perimeter and located near the boardwalk on each beach. Each designated smoking area will be equipped with urns that smokers can use to dispose of their cigarette butts. Signs at each beach entrance will remind smokers that there is No Smoking on the beach except in designated areas and will point smokers to the nearest designated smoking area.

Smoking on the boardwalk is already prohibited under the 2001 ordinance, except where designated. In response to complaints that existing white-on-blue “Smoking Prohibited” signs on the boardwalk are not sufficiently visible, new blue-on-white signs will be installed to better contrast with other boardwalk signage.

Under the existing 2001 ordinance, the fine for violating the smoking ordinance is $25. The Mayor and Council will also be considering in the future an ordinance amending the 2001 ordinance to make $25 the minimum fine and providing for a maximum fine of $250 in the discretion of the municipal court judge.

The Department of Public Works will create the designated smoking areas and install the new signage in time for the June 15, 2009 full-time beach season.

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