Lavallette Urged to Eschew Deliveries of Paper Phone Books

A 2019 Ocean County phone book. (Photo: Daniel Nee)

In the internet age, phone directory books have become something of a relic of the past, yet they are still delivered every year (albeit in a much thinner form factor than 20 years ago).

For island towns, the books can become a nuisance if they are placed in front of a home whose owners are seasonal residents only. Mantoloking recently took the unique step of requesting Verizon deliver all of its phone books to town hall instead of having them left on doorsteps or in front yards – and one Lavallette resident told officials the same thing should be done here.

“You can insist they deliver them to one location,” said resident Clem Boyers. “They decided on borough hall, and it worked.”

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Boyers added that delivering the phone books to a central location could also help protect homes that are empty in the winter since a book left rotting in a front yard could signal vacancy to potential burglars.

Lavallette officials said they would consider the request, with Mayor Walter LaCicero jokingly taking it one step further: “Maybe a good place to deliver them would be the recycling bin,” he said with a laugh.