Route 40 (https://rtforty.com/author/elinor-comlay/page/5/)
The Hispanic Alliance of Atlantic County is calling on residents to come to the next Atlantic City council meeting on Feb. 20 to support Hispanic officers as the police department prepares for a round of promotions.
The owner of the Atlantic Club, one of Atlantic City’s oldest shut casinos, has agreed to sell the property to a businessman with ties to the city.
Property documents filed with the county in January show that TJM, the Florida-based Atlantic Club owner, reached an agreement to sell the property to Jeffrey Smolinsky and his company, North American Acquisitions.
Businesses and other organizations in Atlantic County are offering to help workers who have been furloughed because of the government shutdown. Here is a list of current offers for workers and places where members of the public can donate food.
Representative Bill Pascrell asks a question I know has been on my mind latley: “Why is Congress so dumb?”
Almost unbelievably, he puts forward a plausible answer.
Construction could start as soon as the Spring for the next phase of the Orange Loop entertainment and apartment project in Atlantic City.
This phase of the beach-block project will include a 10-room hotel, retail and apartment space, an entertainment area featuring a stage and concession stands and a 51-space parking lot.
The new stretch of Atlantic City Boardwalk that opened in the summer will be getting lights and ramps, according to a bid notice this week. Temporary ramp access at the end of the new length of Boardwalk near the Flagship in the Inlet had to be installed after the project opened, without lights or ramps. The boards were added above a new sea wall built by the Army Corps of Engineers as part of a project funded by the federal, state and local governments. The boardwalk was added as part of the sea wall project, but the engineers said the city was responsible for access and lighting. Walters Marine Construction is seeking suppliers and subcontractors for the new project, which will install lights and ramps between Melrose Avenue in the north Inlet and Oriental Avenue in the south Inlet.
Billionaire investor Carl Icahn appears to be getting ready to sell his remaining Atlantic City property, the Trump Plaza. An Icahn-backed company, IEP AC Plaza, recently paid $3 million for the deed to the long-shuttered casino, according to property documents filed in December. (You can have a look at the docs here and h/t to Reuben Kremer for his ceaseless monitoring of the property records).
Icahn’s conglomerate Icahn Enterprises took control of the Trump Plaza and Trump Taj Mahal when the previous owner, Trump Entertainment Resorts, entered bankruptcy in 2014. Icahn sold the Taj Mahal to a consortium of local investors and Hard Rock International in 2017. But his attempts to sell the Plaza were stymied by the site’s ground lease, which was held by earlier investors and acted as a so-called poison pill to prevent the sale, according to the New York Post.
A brand-new office and research space for aviation companies is slowly appearing on the edges of the Atlantic City Airport. It is a $26 million bet for Atlantic County and its taxpayers.
Real estate developer Bart Blatstein and Florida-based hotel company TJM owe Atlantic City almost four million dollars in unpaid taxes from this year, according to the city’s tax sale list.
The Atlantic County Clerk’s Office has received over 15,000 mail-in ballot requests for the 2018 General Election and the record number is putting pressure on the clerk’s office to confirm signatures on the ballots.
Several voters told Route 40 their signature was rejected from a mail-in absentee ballot or an in-person mail-in ballot. There have been more rejections than usual because the number of mail-in ballots is so high, said Mike Sommers, deputy county clerk.