A Seaside Heights Beach Patrol vehicle. (Photo: Daniel Nee)
Seaside Heights has long allowed surfers and anglers to access the beach without purchasing a beach badge, so when New Jersey legislators proposed a bill last year that would extend the policy to all beaches up and down the coast, there was no opposition.
“Our local surfers are knowledgeable, they don’t go when it’s incredibly crowded and they know where to go to catch the best wave,” said Mayor Anthony Vaz. “The same with our fishermen. We haven’t charged them and it was never an issue.”
Then, suddenly, the rather uncontroversial bill changed drastically.
As it moved through the state General Assembly, the text referencing surfing and fishing was removed, and replaced with general language concerning “recreation.” The law would not prohibit towns from charging for beach access – a reality since state funding for local beach operations is effectively non-existent in the Garden State – but would allow anyone engaging in a recreational activity to enter the beach as long as they remain below the high water mark, essentially the wet sand near the immediate shoreline and in the water itself.
The issue isn’t so much about badge fees, but the potential for chaos, officials said. The bill could be interpreted to allow kayaks, canoes, heavy surfboards, stand-up paddleboards and even battery-assisted watersports equipment in close proximity to bathers, creating a safety hazard. It would also create an environment in which people may simply lie about their intentions, skirting the fees that pay the salaries of lifeguards, sanitation workers, maintenance crews, as well as the infrastructure that goes into a beach operation. The law, some said, might also undermine the issue it was supposed to address: eliminating questions about beach access to avoid escalating confrontations between visitors and authorities.
Vaz said his main concern surrounds lifeguards, who would suddenly be tasked with watching over swimmers as well as any combination of people engaging in other recreational activities that could be dangerous in the presence of breaking ocean waves.
Legislative Changes
The practical issues with the bill came with the recent revision, said Christopher Vaz, Seaside Heights’ borough administrator.
“It went into a committee at the Assembly level and they changed it by deleting surfing and fishing, and basically said we can’t require beach tags for any recreational activity as long as it’s taking place on the wet, sandy beach by the mean high tide line,” he explained to borough council members Wednesday. “We thought this through, and thought of the chaos this would create. We want to encourage them to go back to the language that was in the original bill.”
Seasonal employees, he said, could end up getting caught in the middle of arguments over the legal definition of a “recreational use” and the mean high water mark.
Lifeguards keep watch over the beach in Ortley Beach, N.J. (Photo: Daniel Nee)
An Ortley Beach lifeguard chair and rescue boat. (Photo: Daniel Nee)
“We have a lot of high school kids who work our beach. Their job is hard enough,” said Vaz. “I listen to the radio all day long and hear what goes on. Now they would have to worry about defining, at the top of the ramp, ‘what is a recreational activity?’ It’s an impossible job.”
There is also a question of enforcement. While the bill’s language initially clarified that badges would not be required for surfing and fishing, it does not prohibit standard beach badge fees for those who access the beach and enjoy the services provided by local communities. Differentiating between who does – and does not – need a badge may have been easy in the first iteration of the bill in that a person is either surfing, fishing, or not. But “recreation” could be interpreted widely.
“You could have 50 people on line to go down to the beach, and then have five say, ‘Oh, I’m just going down to the wet sand, so I don’t need a beach tag,'” said Vaz. “It’s just becomes, ‘how do you enforce that?'”
The bill, titled A-4816, was introduced in September 2024 by Assemblywoman Margie Donlon (D-Monmouth). It went unchanged until amendments were added Feb. 13, 2025 in the Assembly’s Tourism, Gaming and Arts Committee. It passed the committee in a 4-2 vote, making it eligible for a roll call on the full body. Its companion bill in the state Senate, S-4158, sponsored by Sen. Vin Gopal (D-Monmouth), has yet to pass the Senate Environment and Energy Committee, however a vote is expected on the measure in the near future.
The Seaside Heights Beach Control/badge station. (Photo: Shorebeat)
A beach badge sign on the Ortley Beach oceanfront. (Photo: Daniel Nee)
The Seaside Heights borough council voted unanimously to request the legislature revert the language of the bill to reflect surfing and fishing as allowable activities, and ensure it applies only to those who are “actively” surfing and fishing – language similar to the policies implemented at Island Beach State Park for four wheel drive access.
“When you get a populated beach, you have to worry about people’s lives,” Anthony Vaz, the mayor, said. “Now you’re causing another problem for our attendants and lifeguards – you’ll have them being responsible for a whole gamut of activities going on at once.
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