as we kick off the summer season this Memorial Day we're using the broadcast to examine New Jersey's shrinking Shoreline we look at the significance this has on tourism and its impact on the state's economy as well as the billions of federal and state dollars being spent to maintain New Jersey's beaches each year to put it in context New Jersey ranks number one in the country for spending on beach replenishment you can see it best from the air how climate change and sea level rise is impacting the coastline in some sections beaches are now less than a football field wide and places like North Wildwood and Atlantic City are desperate for emergency repairs before the summer tourism season kicks into high gear we begin with senior correspondent Brenda Flanagan in North Wildwood Beach season a real Cliffhanger here in North Wildwood ravaged Dunes look like they've been bulldozed its skinny Beach brutally stripped of sand by erosion can almost disappear here under a high tide in some sections Joe checks tide charts before walking his dog Finn come on I play the tide so basically low tide I'll come out here so I have a little bit more Beach High Tide there's no beach none no so where you going to put your towel Steve's a hotel handyman like other locals he's concerned because if North Wildwood loses beachfront it loses business the town markets itself with the motto Sun and Sand summer resident Lucille stanziale says cancellations have already started rolling in and I think it's taking a financial hit on the whole area here because a lot of people have cancelled and relocated to a different part of the the shore or they're just going on cruises or going somewhere else because there's because of the beach being so limited in space it's devast ating to see all this uh sand gone yeah yeah it's we've been coming down for years with our grandkids for over 30 years and there was always room on the beach I mean it would get crowded but there was plenty of room and the last couple years it just I don't know what happened North Wildwood's been fighting to hold on to its sand for years this Dune is 16 ft High it used to run for about 25 yards and then after that was the beach the beach went for a 100 yards I mean that's as long as a football field almost none of it's left so really in the last 2 years is when we saw this really dramatic erosion because we had no means of replenishing it North Wildwood mayor Patrick rosanell explains they had built back this Shoreline using emergency truckloads of sand driven along the water line from neighboring Wildwood but erosions erased so much Beach dump trucks couldn't squeeze around Amusement peers to make the trip anymore the city tried to build a steel bulkhead barrier to protect streets like 13th Avenue with no Dunes its wide open to the waves vulnerable to Ocean storms like the one back in January 2016 just from a a nor Easter that just happened to coincide with a full moon and a high tide and an intense nor Easter and it caused significant damage however North Wildwood's bulkhead plan hit a different kind of barrier the DEP denied them a permit claiming bulkheads here would only make the problem worse facing a virtually beachless summer the hapless City sued the state just a half hour drive north the federal government came to Sea Isle City's rescue with a scheduled sand drudging project to repair its eroded Shoreline the Army Corps of Engineers started replenishing three beaches along Sea Isle City's ocean front in May the Corp works on a rotating multi-year cycle with Shore towns that started in the early 1990s in SE is it's pumping and spreading enough sand to fill 140 football fields 4 feet deep by Memorial Day the economic engine is tourism here for us it's very important that our beaches are vibrant our beaches are open and our beaches are able to be used by people to come here the beaches are our Lifeline but at what cost one eye openening study shows that per foot of Shoreline New Jersey leads the nation in Beach replenishment more than $3 billion from all sources adjusted for inflation since 1936 $245 million cubic yards of sand and that sand keeps getting washed away sometimes catastrophically superstorm Sandy obliterated much of ortley beach part of Tom's River the core repaired ortley Dunes in 2019 and it's in the pipeline for more Federal Beach nourishment but with relentless erosion chewing at ortley Slender ribbon of sand Tom's Rivers had to spend more than 1.3 million out of pocket since 2021 dollars it can ill afford just to maintain its beaches until the core arrives for the feds it's a mission in general in New Jersey with a very highly developed Shoreline with homes businesses roads boardwalks utility lines all of that generally speaking beachville emerged as the most cost-effective way to manage the risk Stockton university has identified lots of erosion hot spots all along the Jersey Shore some places even flood on sunny days simply from high tides with New Jersey sea levels projected to rise another 2 feet by 2050 Stockton's Kim McKenna warns the Army Corps may have to rethink its approach it means we all have to figure out how to adapt to that if we're not willing to move off of the barer islands we have to figure out what's the best way to adapt to these Rising Waters we can certainly Place more sand on the beaches it's going to be extremely expensive the fear is everyone's going to have a different breaking point and every municipality has different challenges Christina Rena heads South Jersey Chamber of Commerce she says short tourism generates 20 to 30 billion dollars a year mostly from Atlantic and Cape May counties but with erosion now outpacing the Army corps's efforts to repair beaches in some places it's a changing economic reality the replenishment projects are necessary and expensive creating infrastructure new infrastructure that is raised higher expensive there is no easy solution to this problem it's a risky business casinos along Atlantic cities erosion prone North End have privately paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to replenish sand that winter storms gouged out of their beaches but it's gone now and the city's not due for Army Corps Beach replenishment until next year the mayor sees an imminent threat to both tax revenues and Public Safety the beach is dangerous right now um you can see the condition uh that is in uh we have a tremendous uh Beach Patrol and everything but safety is uh first and foremost and uh that's what we that's what we're going to stress here so when you think about all of the businesses that are impacted by Beach tourism anywhere from of course the casino hotels but non-casino hotels so many vendors depend on the beach tourism Atlantic City's working with State officials meanwhile North Wildwood scored a last minute emergency rescue the 17 million doll dredging project in nearby Herford Inlet will soon funnel more than 330,000 cubic yards of sand via pipeline to help bolster the town's damaged beach front until the Army Corps can do up fullscale Beach restoration next year New Jersey pays 10 million the city 7 million the bigger sandy beach by July 4th Priceless so Herford Inlet hasn't been dredged in over 10 years uh there's a restriction on using any federal money to dredge Herford Inlet but because this project will be 100% state and local we're able to dredge out of Herford Inlet how you feel I feel very good right now I'm very appreciative of Governor Murphy um this has been a long road it is kind of scary Mother Nature is getting a little vicious out there but I have faith in our mayor and our governor to come to a reasonable solution to all of this until its Beach gets rebuilt the town will ban big Cabanas and outside tents so more folks like Lucille and her family can fit in to enjoy the Sun and Sand in North Wildwood I'm Brenda Flanagan NJ Spotlight News.